


Star Wars Episode VIII: The (Alternative) Last Jedi

by egnanbuny



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Everyone Stays in Character, Filling in Plot Holes, Fix-It, Gen, Let's Not Go to Canto Bight, No Porgs (But Some Porgs Though), People Aren't Idiots All the Time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-09
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-02 20:39:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 31,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13326063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/egnanbuny/pseuds/egnanbuny
Summary: An alternative version of The Last Jedi, with (hopefully) fewer plot holes than the movie and (hopefully) as much of that good ol' Star Wars spirit. Begins at the same starting point as the movie, until they realise that maybe it’s not a coincidence that the First Order shows up at every party Finn goes to…Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed The Last Jedi! It’s a gorgeous movie (and I'm shamelessly plagiarising it). But also, the plot is more full of holes than the nearest console after someone told Kylo Ren that his hair looked stupid.And that’s fine - but unfortunately for me, my brain started writing a less plot-hole-y version *while* I was watching the movie. Distracting, it was. Rather than whine about it, I decided to get it out on paper instead.So. Hopefully there’s someone out there who might enjoy reading as much as I enjoyed writing!Side note: I am not a die-hard Star Wars fan, just someone who enjoyed the movies (Well. 4-8, anyway). I don’t know anything about the Extended Universe or fan-theories or what counts as canon. Sorry!





	1. Chapter 1

_The FIRST ORDER reigns. Having_

_annihilated the peaceful Republic,_

_Supreme Leader Snoke faces only one_

_barrier to total control of the Galaxy - the_

_brave fighters of the RESISTANCE._

 

_Led by General Leia Organa, the_

_Resistance stand against the rising tyranny,_

_certain that Jedi Master Luke Skywalker_

_will return and restore a spark of hope_

_to their fight._

 

_But they have been discovered. As the First_

_Order speeds towards the rebel base, the_

_Resistance must mount a desperate_

_escape, or face total destruction…_

 

 

The planet hung beneath them, a green orb bright against the darkness of space. Transport ships were still spilling off the surface, beading up towards the mothership which hung silhouetted against the glow of the planet’s atmosphere.

“Like rats abandoning their nest,” muttered General Hux, his eyes narrowed as he stared out at them. “We have them this time.”

“Sir, Captain Canady reports that his orbital ventral cannons are online.”

“Good. Fire.”

The beam streaked towards the planet. Hux smiled tautly, the fireball as the base was obliterated just about visible from his foredeck. 

“Tell Canady to recharge. I want him to destroy their flagship next. Once they lose that they’ll have nowhere to go.” He glanced down at his first lieutenant. “I want the squadron cutting off their escape route. We’re going to tighten the net.”

“Sir.” One of his officers looked up from her screen. “I have an incoming enemy vessel. Coming in fast. Looks like an X-wing fighter.”

“Just _one_?” He looked back out of the windows. “Turbocannons. Take it down.”

“It’s hailing us.”

He rolled his eyes. “Put it though. See how long they can talk and dodge at the same time.”

“Is this thing on?” The Resistance pilot’s voice echoed through the bridge. “Hey. Is General Hux there? Skinny guy, bad hair? The one with the crazy eyes. Put Hux on.”

“This is Hux.” He shot a glare at the nearest weapons officer. “I said _take him down.”_

“Oh, whoa, you’re _shooting_ at me,” came the voice of the pilot. “That isn’t… very… nice. No _wonder_ no-one likes you guys.” 

“How long does it take to take out _one_ _fighter_?” he hissed at the weapons officer, feeling his patience fracturing. 

“Depends on the fighter,” said the pilot. “You know, whispering doesn’t work on these things. I can still hear you.”

“He’s too fast!” said the officer, in frustration. “Our weapons aren’t designed for such small craft as such close range.”

“Then send in the TIE fighters!” he said. 

“They’ve already been deployed to the other side of the-“

“Call them back! And keep firing!”

“Hey. Anyway. Crazy-eye Hux. I’ve got a message for you from General Organa.” The Rebel pilot’s voice echoed through the bridge, and Hux felt his face heating up with rage.

“ _What_?” he demanded. 

There was a pause. 

“Actually, never mind,” said the pilot, and Hux could hear the grin in the damn man’s voice. “Too late anyway.”

He saw a blue streak move past the windows, heading directly towards _Fulminatrix_. 

“Get me Canady,” he snarled. “And I want every TIE fighter we have out there taking him _down. Now.”_

He could feel a headache coming on. A perfectly good day, ruined already. Damn those Rebel scum. 

 

* * *

 

Poe whooped as the G-forces shoved him back into his seat, unable to keep the grin off his face. He flicked off the booster as he approached the dreadnought, weaving easily around the first few cannon shots they sent his way. BB-8 warbled in alarm behind him.

“Oh, relax, BB, that was fun. Happy beeps, remember?” he said, and then narrowed his eyes as he scanned the surface of the First Order ship. “Happy… beeps. Okay, let’s do this.”

He kept _Black One_ low as they skimmed the topside of the ship, feeling his fighter with every muscle. _One… two… three… four…_ Gun turret after gun turret exploded under his thumb. He pushed the fighter harder, rolling to avoid another cannon shot, and looped back around. _Nine… ten…eleven…_

He grinned. He was enjoying thinking about the look on Hux’s face at this moment. This was poetry. 

_Fifteen, sixteen…_ over halfway there. The dreadnought would scramble its TIE fighters at any moment. He didn’t have long before this got very hot indeed. _Seventeen, eighteen, nineteen…_

BB-8 beeped urgently. Incoming TIE fighters - either from the _Finalizer_ or the dreadnought, it didn’t much matter. _Twenty_.

He jammed the throttle back and skidded _Black One_ around, just in time to face two TIE fighters head-on. One hurtled past him; the other exploded in a whirl of fire, slamming onto the surface of the Dreadnought. He flicked on the booster for a brief second of speed to get clear before the first fighter turned around. _Twenty-one, twenty-two -_ a quick loop, and the other fighter was down - _twenty-three_ \- three more TIE fighters, and he took them on a breakneck chase around the belly of the ship, a brief glance of the ventral cannon glowing dully as it recharged for another shot - and then one crashed into another gun turret, ricocheting off into the path of the second. _Twenty-four_. 

Two gun turrets left, and his sky was getting crowded. He led another pair of TIE fighters right into one of the remaining turrets, rolling to avoid the-

There was a bang, his cockpit shuddered and BB-8 screamed. He ears were ringing.

He had no idea of what the damage was, or even what had hit him. Instinctively he pulled up into a steep climb so that the TIE fighters - too slow to react - ran right into their own friendly fire. One of them crashed into the turret as the other swerved off at the last second. 

_Twenty-five_. One turret left.

“BB, buddy, you ok? What’ve we got?” he shouted, doing a quick sweep of the systems in the cockpit. Red lights flashed back at him. BB-8 chirped a rapid stream of Binary.

“Black Leader, your systems link says you’ve taken damage,” came General Organa’s voice over his comms. “The bombers are almost in position. What’s your status?”

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” he said. “Weapons systems offline. One turret left. I’ve got this.”

“Pull out, Black Leader. One turret is too many. I’m cancelling the run.” 

“No, General, I’ve got this. BB-8 can fix it. I can do it!”

“Poe. Pull out. That’s an order.”

“No!” He took _Black One_ in a tight roll, dodging and weaving to avoid the fire from another trio of TIE fighters. “Keep the bombers in position. I’ll take care of the turret.” He swerved right, and one of the TIE fighters clipped the other’s wing and spiralled out of control. “BB, come on buddy. I need one more shot. Just one more.”

The little droid beeped from within the body of his fighter. The weapons systems flickered for a moment. “Nearly there!” yelled Poe. “Nearly got it!”

Outside the cockpit, space was suddenly filled with ships and flashes of light. 

“All wings, this is Blue Leader. We are beginning our approach. Bombers, keep formation. Fighters, the turrets are down but there’s a lot of enemies out there. Protect the bombers at all costs. Let’s take out a dreadnought today.”

“All ships, this is Cobalt Leader. Commencing bombing run.”

“BB!” yelled Poe. “Come on, buddy, now or never!”

He heard the droid squall from somewhere deep in the fighter. The weapons system flickered back on. “Yeah!” He slammed _Black One_ back in a loop, heading for the last cannon.

“Damn it,” he heard Lintra yell. “One of their cannons is still-“

“This is Black Leader, I’m on it!” he shouted.

“We’re taking heavy losses,” someone else reported. “They’re targeting the fighters and we-“ The comms system crackled; outside his cockpit, he saw a bloom of flame. 

“Come on, come on,” he muttered. _Black One_ was fighting him, the ship straining as he threw it towards the final cannon. “ _Come on.”_

The turret exploded, his cockpit briefly orange as he flew through the fireball and pulled up sharply. 

The Resistance squadrons were tightly engaged with enemy fighters, X-wings and TIE fighters looping in and out between the bombers, flashes of green and red blaster fire and clots of flame lighting them up. At least one of the bombers had gone down, scattering debris over the battlefield. As Poe watched, a TIE fighter smashed into the side of another, detonating the bombs within its hold and taking out another X-wing alongside it. 

The bombers were almost over the target now, beginning to dip down in preparation for their run. There were too few fighters to protect them, and too many TIE fighters attacking; he saw another bomber explode in a gout of fire, careening drunkenly into the one beside it and sending it veering off course, its hull in flames. 

Poe hurled _Black One_ into the fray, despite BB-8’s shrilly-beeped protests, looping and ducking between the few remaining bombers. Only three left, now - and even then, there didn’t seem to be enough of Blue Squadron left to protect them.

“This is Blue Leader. Come on, Cobalt, I want to see some big fireworks in this party,” came Lintra, over the comms. “What are you doing?”

“This is Cobalt Wasp. We’ve taken damage to our delivery system,” came the voice of one of the bombardiers. “We can’t-“

Another explosion filled Poe’s cockpit with a wash of light, and he had to jerk _Black One_ sideways to avoid being hit by debris from the bomber. 

“Dammit,” he heard Lintra swear. “Cobalt, _come on_ , release your payloads. We’ve gotta take this hulk down _._ ”

It was taking all of his skill and focus just to avoid being hit; he had at least five TIE fighters on his tail, and _Black One_ was whining as he threw her into another complicated series of evasions, trying to shake them off. 

Beneath them, a sudden roll of fire unfurled across the top of the dreadnought; one of the bombers had managed to score a hit. He saw it peel off from the run, struggling to gain speed, tailed by several TIE fighters which were bombarding it with plasma fire steadily. 

“One more, Cobalt Hammer - come on, what are you doing? Launch your payload!” shouted Lintra. “One more good hit and she’s down!”

There was no answer from the ship, which lurched downwards towards the dreadnought. He took out a pair of TIE fighters which had swept around to dive-bomb it, and then finally - _finally_ \- saw the bombs launch, tumbling down onto the dreadnought just beneath its bridge.

“Yes!” he shouted, and banked hard as the huge ship slowly cracked in two beneath them, releasing a rolling gush of flame.

“Cobalt Hammer, pull up!” yelled Lintra. 

The bomber was still heading downwards; it hit the bridge of the dreadnought almost in slow motion, the flames ripping through both ships. 

“Back to the _Raddus_ ,” ordered Lintra. “Blue Squadron, back to the _Raddus_. The dreadnought is down. We’ve done good work today.”

He throttled up and fell into formation with the rest of Blue Squadron. They passed the wreck of the final bomber as they went, hanging above the cracked shell of the dreadnought, the cannon-holes gaping in its hull. He winced. Every one of the seven bombers of Cobalt down, and half of Blue Squadron too - but they had taken out one of the First Order’s best and most deadly battleships, one that could have destroyed the entire Resistance Fleet if it had gone unchallenged. 

The last of the transports were just being loaded aboard the _Raddus_ as they arrived, and the hangar was full of activity as the fighters touched down, to cheers from the ground crews. 

BB-8 beeped, picking up on the chatter from the mothership’s systems as Poe began shutting down _Black One_ ’s flight controls.

“What?” He twisted in the cockpit to look at the little droid. “‘Finn, leaking, naked’… _what?_ Buddy, I think that trick with the weapons systems might have scrambled your circuits, you’re not making…”

Finn wandered past the hanger doors, wearing nothing but a flexpoly suit - which was, indeed, leaking bacta all over the floor - and a dazed expression.

“…sense.”

He catapulted out of _Black One_ to sprint over to Finn before he did himself a worse injury. 

“Finn, buddy, you’re up! How do you feel?”

“Wha-“ Finn blinked at him in confusion. “Poe? Where…? Where’s Rey?” He looked down at the various tubes sticking out of the suit, still leaking. “What’s…?”

“Ok, ok. Take it easy.” Poe wondered what the hell the medics were playing at, letting Finn go wandering around the ship. “We’re on the _Raddus_. A Star Cruiser. I’ll explain… just… uh… maybe we should get you some clothes first.”

 

* * *

 

“ _General_.”

Snoke’s voice was scorching with anger. 

“You had the Rebels _pinned down_ , and yet again they have evaded you. _”_ His hologram loomed over the bridge, making Hux feel uncomfortably small. He wished Snoke had allowed him to receive the transmission in private. “And _yet again_ you have allowed them to destroy a valuable weapon. I am tired of your incompetence, Hux.” 

Shame mingled with anger in his chest, constricting his throat. “Supreme Leader, I-“

“ _None_ of your excuses,” roared Snoke. His throat tightened further and he realised with a jolt of panic that he was choking. He tried to suck in air, his knees giving way beneath him. “I am coming to oversee the destruction of the rebels _myself_.”

“Supreme Leader-“ he managed to wheeze, clawing at his own throat. The pressure released, suddenly, and he gasped down a lungful of air. The other officers on the bridge were staring at him.

“The- the rebels will not escape for long,” he said, hoarsely. 

Snoke growled. “No?”

“We have them on a string.” Hux loosened his collar, still breathing heavily. “They cannot run forever.”

And then he explained.

Snoke was still chuckling, the sound making an uncomfortable rasping noise in his withered throat, when Kylo Ren entered his throne room. “Good… excellent. Today is the day we destroy the rebellion once and for all. Hux may be an incompetent fool, but he has his uses.” He twisted his head to look at Ren directly. “Remove your mask. You know why I have summoned you here.”

The mask hissed around his face as he obeyed. “Because I have healed-“

“Because you have _failed_.” Snoke leaned forwards, the skin around his knuckles tightening as he gripped his throne. “Because you are _weak._ You were supposed to burn that weakness out. I see now that instead you are letting it consume you.”

“Master, I-“

“Do not presume,” Snoke snarled, “to call me that. You cannot even master yourself. You have learned _nothing_ that I have shown you.”

“I have learned-!”

“Then tell me how you were beaten by a _child_ who knows _nothing_ of the Force? Tell me how you were bested by Han Solo, the man you swore you cared nothing for?”

“I _killed_ Han Solo.”

“You allowed yourself to be so distracted by him that you failed to notice an entire _station_ being blown up around you. You allowed yourself to be beaten by an infant who has never even wielded a lightsaber!”

“She is strong with the Force - the planet was about to explode - I was injured!” Ren spoke through clenched teeth. “I will be ready next time. I will not fail.”

“Enough!” roared Snoke. “You were distracted and weak. _That_ is why you failed. I had hoped that you would be a worthy heir to your grandfather, but I see now that you are a frightened child. I had hoped that you wore the mask to honour Darth Vader, but I see now that it is to hide your shame. You do not deserve to bear his blood in your veins.”

Ren rose up, fury in his eyes, his hand reaching for the lightsaber at his waist. 

Snoke clenched his fist and Ren jerked back to his knees, blue lightning crackling around his wrists painfully. The hilt clattered onto the floor, along with his helmet. 

“Do not think that you can challenge me, boy,” growled Snoke. “There is strength in you, great strength. Great anger. I see it. But you cannot become truly great until you have eliminated every weakness. Use your anger. Use your strength. Come back to me when you have burnt them all out.”

 

* * *

 

“Reckless, foolhardy, irresponsible-“ General Organa snapped. “You directly disobeyed my orders. And because of that we’ve lost our bombers, we’ve lost half of our fighters-“

“And we destroyed a _dreadnought_ , General,” he protested. “We took out one of the best ships in their fleet. Think of the kind of damage it could have done. The First Order will be _furious_ -“

“At what cost?” she interrupted. “Poe, as a commander I expect you to see the bigger picture. I expect you to pull your head out of your cockpit and _think_. I expect you to obey orders whether you agree with them or not. I expect you to trust me, Captain.”

“Captain?” he echoed, incredulously. “General Organa, I-“

“I’m demoting you,” she said. “I know enough arrogant hotheads who think that every problem can be solved by charging head-on and blowing something up. I don’t need them in command.”

He felt the hot burst of anger in his chest. “General, those men and women out there - our fighters - they’re _heroes_. They-“

“And today you made them martyrs,” Leia said, cutting him off. “Do you understand that, Captain Dameron?”

He shut his mouth. There was a heavy finality in her voice, a weariness. She was looking at the screen above one of the command consoles: a record of the fleet’s current status. Far too many of the ships were etched in red. 

“You can’t win this kind of war with martyrs,” she muttered, almost to herself. “Perhaps it was a mistake to promote you so soon.” 

He stared at her, feeling his cheeks heating up. General Organa wasn’t just angry; there was genuine regret in her voice, and he realised that she was blaming herself - blaming herself for the deaths of the men and women he’d killed. Blaming herself for putting him in a position where he could make such a costly mistake. Blaming herself for trusting his judgement when he’d said he could take out the last turret in time.

“General, I-“ 

“Proximity alert!” someone shouted across the command room. “General, it’s- it’s the First Order. They’ve found us!”

Leia’s head snapped up and she abandoned her screens. “How many?”

“Just coming out of hyperspace now. Two - no, three - no, four ships. _Huge_ ships.” The lieutenant’s saucer-like eyes were wide. “General, it’s a Star Destroyer. It’s… I think it’s _Supremacy_.”

Snoke’s ship. 

The command room erupted. “Shields up,” commanded Leia. “Get me the other commanders. Maximum throttle. I want to be out of range of their gun turrets _now_.”

“General, we don’t have enough in the hyperdrive to jump again. I can burn some of our fuel to kickstart the motivator, but even then it will take us at least twelve hours to recharge,” called one of the lieutenants, her voice panicked. 

“How the hell did they find us?” demanded one of the admirals. “They can’t have tracked us through hyperspace. The odds of just happening to guess where we’d come out are a million to-“

“Don’t tell me the odds,” said Leia. “They’ve done it. They must be tracking us somehow. We have to figure out how before we jump again. If we burn our fuel and they track us through a second jump-“

_We’ll be dead in the water_. Nobody said it, but the words hung in the command centre all the same. 

“General, let me take a squadron. If we take out their engines they can’t follow us, even if-“

“No.” She cut him off again. “You’ll be too far for us to provide covering fire and we need all of our fighters to defend our fleet.” 

“They’re firing on us,” warned another admiral, his hologram flickering. Outside, a bloom ofgreen lit up the window briefly. “Shields are holding for now.”

“Keep going. Full acceleration. Don’t get too close to the other fleet ships, let’s not make this too easy for them,” said Leia. “If we can keep them at a distance until the hyperdrive recharges we might just have a chance. We’ll send out squadrons if they try for sorties, but otherwise don’t engage. Keep me informed.”

The hologrammed admirals nodded, flickered, and disappeared. 

“We need to know how they’re tracking us,” said Leia. “I want people combing through our databanks on anything we might have. If there’s a way to stop it, I want to know about it.”

 

* * *

 

Luke Skywalker stared at the lightsaber in his hands.

“No.” 

He tossed it over his shoulder. Then he looked up at Rey and his blue eyes narrowed. “Go,” he said, clearly and deliberately,“away.”

He strode past her - ignoring her open-mouthed indignation - and started down the path, his cloak flapping in the wind.

“Wait! You’re - you’re him, aren’t you? You’re Luke Skywalker,” she called. “What do you mean, ‘go away’? I’ve come halfway across the _galaxy_ to look for you.”

He kept going, without even looking up. She scrambled after him, almost slipping on the stones of the path. They were smooth, worn down by centuries of rough weather and exposure to the sea. Perhaps people as well. She wondered if anyone else lived on the island - whether the houses she and Chewbacca had spotted on the approach were occupied.

“Hey. Wait,” she said, catching up with the man and grabbing his arm. “ _Wait.”_

He turned in shock, looking down at her hand as if he’d never seen one before. She dropped it. “You have to listen to me. I’ve come from General Organa. Leia. Your sister.”

He frowned. “I said, ‘go away’.”

“ _No_.” Of all of the many ways she’d imagined this conversation would go, this was not one of them. Luke Skywalker, the greatest Jedi Master in the galaxy, a legend in his own lifetime… and she had just told him _no_. The wash of fear propelled her onwards. “I can’t go away. You have to come back. We need you.”

He stared at her for a long moment. He looked older than she had imagined him, his grey hair flecked with white and his face lined. 

“No.” 

He started walking again. She overtook him and cut him off, her hands on her hips. “Leia sent me. The First Order destroyed an entire _system_ , they destroyed the whole Republic, the Resistance is all there is left, we _need_ you. We need the Jedi. We need… we need…” She struggled for words.

He scowled at her. “The galaxy doesn’t need the Jedi.”

“We need _you.”_

“No.”

“ _Yes_.” She stood firm, challenging him even though her heart was pounding and her mouth felt dry. 

“I don’t have to explain myself to you. Go home,” he said, pushing past her. He paused a little way down the mountain, speaking without looking at her. “How did you get here, anyway? Who told you how to find me? And where did you get that saber?”

“I - we - we found your map,” she said, confused. “And Maz Kenata gave me your lightsaber. And I got here on the Millennium Falcon,” she added, pointing vaguely to the landing stage somewhere down on the cliffs.

“Han brought you, then. I would have thought he’d have known better than to come. Leia I can understand, she always was ridiculously idealistic,” muttered Luke. “Tell him his bad feeling was right this time. I’m not coming back.”

“I - I can’t,” she said, still confused. “Han - he - it was on Starkiller Base, he- Kylo Ren - Ben - he killed him.” She bit her lip, not wanting to remember the look on Han’s face. “He was trying to bring him home and he put his lightsaber through him like it was nothing.”

Luke didn’t move for a few seconds. She thought she saw his brow furrow. Then he turned and continued on down the mountain, moving with surprising grace on the rocky staircase.She had to scramble to keep up, and even then she kept slipping and almost twisting her ankle.

He took a fork which curved around the mountainside, and she had to stop or fall over her own feet. Twin suns lanced through the clouds over the sea, which was glittering like all of the stars in the sky had spilled onto it. Below the path, orange-white creatures were soaring and fluttering among the cliffs while the waves snapped at the rocks, throwing spray up against them. Rey had never seen so much water in her life. On the approach, it hadn’t seemed real - and she had been too nervous about finding Luke to take any of it in anyway - but now…

Now he was almost around the next bend, and she had to run to catch him up. He was clambering down towards the stone huts, she realised - little stacked domes of grey slate, nestling into the mountainside, squat and somehow reassuring.

Until he slammed the door in her face. She considered trying to knock, but something told her that she’d irritated him enough for one day. 

Rey stared at the closed door for a few seconds more, and then leaned her staff against the wall and folded herself down onto her legs to wait. 

She was good at waiting.

 

* * * 

 

“Captain Dameron.” 

He wasn’t even sure what he wanted to say. To apologise? To argue? To defend himself? “General Organa, I-“

“We don’t have time for this. Captain, I need you to find Finn.”

“Find Finn? Wha- where’s Finn? Why do I-?”

“I need you to get him off this ship.”

Poe was completely lost. Was he- was General Organa throwing him off the ship? Was she so angry with him that she was actually exiling him? And what did Finn have to do with anything? He hadn’t been involved in the battle - he hadn’t even been conscious for most of it.

“Listen to me. They’re tracking us somehow, and he’s the only thing the First Order have had direct contact with that we’ve got on this ship. I don’t know how they’re doing it, and I don’t even know if I’m right, but… the First Order have followed him to every place he’s been since he rescued you.”

The realisation hit Poe like a punch to the stomach. “But… he can’t be a traitor. He _saved_ me. He’s… he helped us take down _Starkiller_ , he nearly _died_ -“

“I know.”

“And he’s not the only thing the First Order have had contact with, they had _me_ , I was their prisoner, I-“

“I know.” General Organa’s eyes were steady on his. 

“But…” He had a sick feeling in his stomach. “They didn’t kill me. I thought… they got everything they wanted, they knew about the map - but they left me alive. Why did they do that? And they let us escape… they shot at us, but… we made it down to Jakku…” 

“I need you to take him somewhere far away from here. We’ve got a training A-wing ready for hyperspeed.”

“General-“

“I recommend Galtuulan.”

He was shocked. “That’s a First Order planet.”

“Where better to hide a stormtrooper? If he’s got some kind of tracker, I hope that the signal will be hidden there. At least until our medics have had time to comb through his medical scans.”

He was silent for a moment. “And mine.”

“Yes. And yours.” General Organa put a hand on his arm, sympathetically. “Poe, I’ve never doubted your commitment to the Resistance. And I don’t want to have to doubt your judgement. Some problems can’t be solved by blowing things up, and this is one of them.”

He wrestled briefly with something to say out of the hundreds of thoughts crowding through his mind. She frowned at him.

“Dismissed, Captain.”

Finn was in the mech wing, reported BB-8. Poe wondered if whatever the droid had done to bring his weapons systems back online earlier really had scrambled some circuits, because he couldn’t think of a single reason why he’d be there. But then, he had been wandering around the flight deck in a leaking bacta suit earlier, so…

He spotted him over by the escape pods, talking to one of the mechanics.

“Finn!” he called. “Finn, buddy, we’ve gotta go, we’re…” 

He trailed off. Finn wasn’t _talking_ to the mechanic - she had pulled a stunner on him, and was pointing it directly at him while he obviously tried to talk his way out of being hit with five thousands volts to the chest. 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, stop, what’re you doing? What’s going on?” He pulled the mechanic’s arm down. “What the hell-?”

“He’s trying to desert!” she hissed, before Finn could speak. “My sister just died fighting for the Resistance and he’s supposed to be a _hero_ and he’s trying to _desert_.” There were tears sparkling on the edge of her eyelashes. “He’s a coward and a traitor and-“ 

She raised her stunner again, and Poe dragged it back down. “No, no, listen, there’s probably some big misunderstanding, I’m sure it’s not…”

He trailed off again. Behind Finn, one of his own bags was packed and slung across the escape pod’s seat. He shifted his eyes to Finn’s face. He looked miserable.

“It’s _true_?” Poe managed.

“I’m trying to protect Rey!” Finn burst out. “She’s gonna come back here not knowing what’s going on and she’s gonna run right into the First Order!” He showed his wrist, blinking with the blue-green light of a Resistance tracking beacon. “She’s supposed to follow this to find us and if I don’t get it out of here-“

Poe was still reeling. Finn had been trying to desert. They were the middle of a battle, and he had been trying to leave the ship, without telling anyone - without even telling _Poe_. 

What if he _was_ a traitor? What if he really had only rescued Poe from the First Order to gain the Resistance’s trust? What if he had volunteered to go on the mission to Starkiller Base to try to make sure it didn’t succeed? What if he was trying to get back to the First Order now - to bring Rey’s tracking bracelet to them directly? 

No. It wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be possible. He was _sure_ it wasn’t possible.

And he had been sure that he could reach the gun turret in time, too. 

“You gotta believe me, Poe,” Finn pleaded. “I’m trying to help. I just… I don’t want any more of my friends to get hurt.”

He shook his head, trying to understand it all. “Listen. We’ve got to leave. General Organa’s orders. We have to get off this ship. There’s an A-wing waiting for us.”

“What?” demanded the mechanic. 

“What?” Finn’s eyes were wide. “Why… why are we…?”

“She thinks that you might be why the First Order keep finding us,” said Poe. “That they might have implanted some sort of… some sort of tracking device. That you don’t know about.”

_Or that you do know about._

Finn gaped at him. So did the mechanic. 

“He’s the reason my sister died?” she said.

“She was in Blue Squadron?” asked Poe, because Finn was still speechless and he wasn’t completely sure that the mechanic wasn’t about to try her stunner again.

“Cobalt. Cobalt Hammer. She was a gunner.” 

“I’m sorry.” He truly was. “She died a hero.”

“Yeah, she did,” said the mechanic, the corners of her mouth turned down unhappily. “And it’s _his_ fault.”

_Or mine_. “We don’t know that. We don’t know if they’re tracking him. But we’re not taking any chances,” said Poe. “Which is why we need to get off the ship.” 

He grabbed his bag from the escape pod and pulled Finn with him. He looked like he was about to cry, following Poe almost as if he were sleepwalking. Then he twisted his arm. 

“Wait! Wait,” he said, and wrestled something off his wrist. “Wait. What’s - what’s your name?”

He was speaking to the mechanic. For a second, she looked as though she would refuse to answer. 

“Rose. Rose Tico. My sister’s name was Paige,” she added. “She wanted to see the galaxy.”

“Rose, I’m - I’m sorry. About your sister. And about trying to leave. But - please. I need you to take this to General Organa.” Finn held out the tracking bracelet. “My friend is gonna need it to come back here, and I - I can’t take it with me. Please. The General will know what to do with it.”

She looked down at the bracelet, then at him, then away. She hesitated. 

“Please,” begged Finn. “I don’t wanna put any more people in danger.”

Rose snatched the bracelet from his hand without looking at him and nodded, briefly. Finn turned back to Poe, relief in his eyes.

“Okay. Let’s go.”

 

* * *

 

Rey woke up with the first dawn, before the second sun had risen in the sky. It wasn’t the least comfortable place she’d had to sleep - not even close - but this planet was no Jakku; the stone wall hadn’t offered much shelter and she was cold. 

Luke scowled when he opened the door and found her sitting on the wall waiting for him. The island _wasn’t_ uninhabited; she’d already spotted several squat, grey-skinned people wearing robes and shuffling around the houses beneath them. They’d looked at her curiously and muttered amongst themselves, but hadn’t tried to approach. She wondered what they were thinking of her. Somehow, she didn’t imagine they saw many strangers.

“I thought I told you,” Luke said, “to go away.”

“You can’t tell me what to do,” she said, calmly. “You’re not my master.”

He scowled at that, too, and stalked past her without looking at her. She got off her wall and followed him.

“I’m not leaving without you,” she called, to his back.

She trailed after him as he strode around the island, resolutely ignoring her. He seemed impervious to everything: the wind; the climbs and cliffs; the rain sweeping in from the ocean in great, freezing sheets which left her soaked and shivering. He stole eggs from the nests of the flying creatures on sheer cliffs and fished for sea-beasts in deep, echoing pools etched into the rock. He harvested seaweed from hidden caves and even collected a pungent green milk from the placid, wallowing lumpen creatures resting on the shore. 

She followed him doggedly, struggling to keep up, too out of breath to try asking him questions. He ignored her just as doggedly. 

And then he disappeared. 

Rey wasn’t sure how he’d done it. One moment he had been there, a dark figure with flapping robes on the rocks above her. The next, she had looked down to check her footing, and… and he had gone. 

She tried to work out where he’d disappeared to for a while, probing suspicious-looking rocks and testing the little half-caves for hidden entrances. Then she sat and glared at the cliff. Then she started wandering. It wasn’t a large island; she was sure to spot him somewhere.

She went to find the lightsaber first, shooing away the bird-things clustering around it and tucking it into her belt. She wasn’t sure why, but she knew that she wasn’t about to let it rust out here, no matter how Luke felt about it.

Her feet took her deeper inland, away from the boom and clatter of the waves and the cries of the bird-creatures as they brought food back to their nests. It had a strange sort of quietness to it as she got further from the sea - a stillness, despite the wind still tugging at her clothes. At least the rain had stopped. 

Rey had liked the rain, at first - loved it, in fact. She had felt like she could have spent her whole life with her face turned up towards it, feeling the fat drops burst against her skin. But then she had realised how cold being wet could be. She hadn’t much liked that part.

She found a tiny valley, sheltered from the wind, and followed it. There were _trees_ here - twisted, ancient things, with little silvery-green leaves shivering. She touched one, gently. It seemed strange to find them here, with the rest of the island so barren. 

There was a bigger one at the head of the gully, but with no leaves and no branches to speak of. It was big enough for a person to fit inside. It should have been completely dark, but somehow a shaft of light had managed to find its way in, illuminating the motes of dust hanging in the air. It must have been dead for years - centuries, maybe. Perhaps it should have felt sad, but…

“What are you doing here?”

Rey snatched her hand back from the books - _books_ \- nestled in the far end of the wooden chamber. A hooded silhouette was standing in the doorway. 

“I - uh, I-“

Luke strode forwards. “Who are you?” he demanded. “Why did you come?”

“I - I - I don’t know!” she burst out. “I don’t know! I’m no-one, I just - just a scavenger from Jakku, I came because General Organa told me to, because-“

“No,” he interrupted. “I asked who you are, and why you came.”

She gulped. She knew what he meant, even though a part of her wished that she didn’t.

“I… On the base. There was something… I never realised, but… it’s like it’s always been there. Inside me. And now it’s awake. And I don’t know… I don’t know what to do,” she said, her voice small. 

He tilted his head, his expression hard to read in the half-light. “You’re Force-sensitive,” he said. “That’s why Leia sent you. To be trained.”

“Um,” she said. 

He shook his head. “She should have trained you herself. She was always too damn stubborn to accept my help. If she’d listened…” He turned away. “I can’t train you.”

“Can’t, or won’t?” she challenged, desperate. To have come so far - for him to finally be talking to her, listening to her… and then rejecting her again-

“Won’t.” He paused, one hand resting on the entranceway, his head bowed under his hood, and then looked back. “Come.”

 

* * *

 

“We should fly out and crush them _now._ ” Kylo Ren sounded sulky, as usual. “We have them at our mercy. And you’re letting them get away.”

“They aren’t getting away,” he snapped. “I _told_ you. We have them on a string. No matter where they go, they can’t escape.”

“They can jump to hyperspace-“

“And we’ll follow them again!” Hux said. Snoke’s rebuke was still smarting, and the fact that Kylo Ren had arrived from his ship looking like someone had broken all of his toys in front of his eyes hadn’t done as much to help as it should have. “We have them trapped.”

“Then why aren’t we _destroying_ them?” whined Ren. “We’re holding back while they could be planning an escape. Don’t tell me you’re trying to save blaster bolts. I know your men are inefficient, but that-”

“I won’t have you questioning my men _or_ my methods,” Hux bit off. “At this distance our ion cannons are ineffective. They have smaller ships; their acceleration is enough to keep them out of range until they run out of fuel.”

“Then let me take a squadron-“

“I will not have you endangering my fighters needlessly. They will be too far from cover. I am more than happy for you to go,” he added, waspishly, “but you will not lead my fighters. The Rebels are outmatched; they can do nothing to avoid their fate, only delay it.” 

Ren exploded into rage. “I want them _dead_ , Hux. I want them dead _now_. I don’t _care_ how it is done. Send for backup. Send for every First Order ship in the galaxy! The Resistance must be _destroyed_.”

Hux held his ground. Lesser men might be intimidated, but he saw Kylo Ren for what he really was. A petulant child, throwing a tantrum when he didn’t get his way. And yet he was Snoke’s favourite. His lip curled. Snoke’s pet, more like. 

“No backup is required. The Rebels cannot escape. And when they finally run out of fuel, _I_ will be the one to destroy the last shred of their filthy rebellion, without a single First Order casualty. You are not necessary.”

Ren had subsided back into smouldering resentment after his outburst. “You’re a fool,” he said. “Supreme Leader Snoke will not tolerate your failure a third time.” He turned and stalked away, pausing at the door to the bridge. “And neither will I.”

 

* * *

 

“They say,” said Luke, pacing up the steps winding around the cliff-edge, “that this is one of the original Jedi Temples. Perhaps even the first.”

It was barely more than a cave, Rey saw, carved out of the highest cliffs on the island. She hadn’t noticed it before because there was nothing _to_ notice. Not from the outside. Just steps cut into the rock, and then a small entranceway to duck into before it widened out - first into one chamber and then another, and another. 

Light filtered through high windows and spilled onto the smooth stone floor. Above them, the rock twisted into a huge, hollow spire, centred above a shallow pool with patterns traced out in light and dark pebbles.

“Constructed long before the Order became so powerful in the galaxy. Before it began to lose sight of what it stood for. I thought it would be fitting for the Jedi to end as they began.”

“But the Jedi can’t end,” protested Rey. “The First Order is getting stronger. Kylo Ren is getting stronger. We _need_ them.”

“No.” Luke sighed, and walked to a rough archway beyond the pool, which led out to an outcrop with a flat-topped rock balancing on it. “You don’t yet understand. The Jedi Order must end.” He turned back to stare at her with uncomfortably piercing blue eyes. “What do you think a Jedi is?”  
The question caught her by surprise. “Uh - well, it’s, uh - someone who controls the Force. Who can make it - make it move things and get into people’s minds and… uh… fly ships really well.”

“Astonishing.” Luke shook his head before the warm glow of praise could kindle in her chest. “Not a single word in that sentence was correct.”

She glared at him. “Well, how am I supposed to know if you won’t teach me?”

“A Jedi,” he said, ignoring her, “is first and foremost a student of the Force. The Jedi devoted their lives to studying the ways of the Force and how to harness it for good. The light side. The only thing a Jedi must control is his- or her- _self_. They do not control the Force because it cannot be controlled, any more than you or I can control the tides or the waves. It can be directed, yes, and used - but it is bound to all living things in the universe and it exists in a state of balance which cannot be disrupted.”

“But you _can_ use it to get into people’s minds and move rocks and… all that stuff,” said Rey. “I’ve _seen_ it.”

Luke gave her a look. It was not the look of a man impressed by his student’s piercing insight.

“I can move this rock,” he said, kicking a pebble across the floor, “and I’m changing the thoughts in your mind right now. At least, I’m _trying_ to,” he muttered. “Do you think that makes me special? Do you think the purpose of my foot is to kick rocks across the floor?”

“No, but-“

“Come.” He gestured to the outcrop, to the flat rock sitting on it. Beyond them, the sea glittered as another dark sweep of rain approached the island. “Sit.”

She sat.

“Close your eyes.”

She closed them.

“Reach out.”

She reached out. 

“Do you feel anything?”

“No - no. Wait. Yes! I can- I can feel i- _ow!”_

She snapped her eyes open to see him staring down at her as if he couldn’t believe her stupidity, holding the stick he’d used to smack across the back of her fingers.

“I… wasn’t meant to actually reach out, was I?” she said, realising.

“No.”

“I’ll try again.”

He was still staring at her like she was some kind of idiot. “…Yeah.”

“Sorry.”

He sighed in frustration and shifted his gaze to stare out at the sea. “It’s going to rain again soon,” she heard him observe. 

And then - somehow, she felt it. Somehow she managed to open whatever channel in her mind she’d reached before, and it was like she’d stepped on loose sand on the top of a dune, and everything was cascading in after her. 

“Oh,” she said. “ _Oh_.”

“You see?”

She didn’t answer. It was rushing around her, tiny grains of- of something, bright sparks and dark ones cascading and tumbling and eddying around each other, swirling into great endless patterns, light and dark, fast and slow, cold, hot, joy, grief, love, hate, fear, hope…

She opened her eyes. Luke was staring at her, his brow furrowed. He looked suddenly older, more wearied. “You saw, didn’t you?”

“I… I think so.” She was breathing hard, trembling slightly, as if she was recovering from a fever. 

“Good. Come back inside.”

She climbed off the rock unsteadily, her mind still fizzing. Luke was waiting for her by the pool. He gestured towards it. 

“Do you see? The pattern? The Force is about balance. Death, life; heat, cold; light, dark; chaos, order. One is meaningless without the other.” Luke sighed, and hunched his shoulders further into his cloak. “That’s what the Jedi forgot. The Force cannot remain unbalanced. If you raise a great light, you cannot help but create great shadows.”

“… The First Order,” said Rey. “You’re talking about Snoke and the First Order.”

“And the Sith, and the Empire. Wherever light rises, there is darkness to meet it. Whenever the Jedi tried to create a utopia in the galaxy, they ended up fighting a war that destroyed millions of lives. In their hubris they believed that they could control it. Bring light to banish the shadows.” He closed his eyes, wearily. “They were wrong. It is the light which _creates_ the shadows.”

“You’re saying that it’s the Jedi’s fault that Snoke exists. That Kylo Ren turned to the dark side. But I don’t understand how.”

“It’s _my_ fault. I am the last Jedi.” Luke was silent for a long moment. “A Force user strong in the light upsets the balance. They must be equalled by a Force user strong in the dark. And no matter who wins in the struggle, people will die. People will suffer. Better to have no Jedi at all.”

“But we need you,” said Rey. “The Resistance needs you. People _are_ suffering.” Her voice rose. “Just because you’re refusing to see doesn’t mean it’s not happening! Snoke and Kylo Ren are getting _stronger_.”

“The Jedi were never supposed to be about destruction,” said Luke. “They forgot that, too. Do you know why you came here?” 

“Because we need you!” she cried. “I need you! I don’t understand what’s happening to me. Within me. And our friends are _dying_ , and we need you.” She suddenly felt frustrated. How could he show her - show her the Force, all of that irresistible, swirling mass of it - and then tell her that he couldn’t help?

“Need me to do _what_?” he countered. “To come back? To march up to Kylo Ren and slice him in half with a lightsaber? To climb into an X-wing and blast Snoke’s flagship to the stars?” His voice was caustic. “None of it would help. None of it would matter. It only upsets the balance further.” He looked at her with sad eyes. “I’m an old man, Rey. Old and bitter. I thought that I could bring light to the galaxy, and I was wrong.”

She felt like she was about to cry. “But we need light. We need _hope_.”

“Better for me to stay a legend, then. Better that than for them to see what I’ve become.”

She stared at him. Suddenly she couldn’t bear it any more.

She ran with no clear idea of where she was going, the rain driving into her eyes and the wind threatening to overbalance her and throw her against the mountainside. She stopped, breathing hard, on a rock overlooking the sea. It was wild, snapping and snarling against the cliffs, throwing white spray up against her face, roaring to match the emotions struggling within her chest.

_You’re upset._

She jerked her head up. The voice was familiar, but how could-?

_You’re angry._ The voice paused. _Where are you?_

“Monster!” she screamed, into the wind. “Murderer!”

_I can hear you,_ said Kylo Ren’s voice. _But I can’t see you. Or your surroundings. Who’s doing this?_

“I _hate_ you,” she hissed, the sobs catching in her throat. “Get out of my head. You’re a vile, lying, murdering traitorous- you’re-“ She was struggling to think of words bad enough to describe what she thought of him. “ _Get out of my head!_ ”

_Interesting_ , said the voice, and then the world seemed to snap back into focus and all she could hear was the roaring of the ocean and her own shuddering breaths as the tears poured down her face.

 

* * *

 

It felt strange to be flying anything other than _Black One_ , but Poe had to give the A-wing one thing - it could really move. Not as fast as that TIE fighter, but the surface of Galtuulan was unrolling like silk as they skimmed over the planet’s landscape - first the wine-dark oceans; then red cliffs streaked with branching veins of white; then endless, rolling fields, crops swishing with the speed of their flight. 

He was keeping as low as possible, to avoid any scanners the First Order might have, and he had dropped in as far as he could manage from the great, shining cities they had seen from orbit. They’d land the A-wing a reasonable distance from the city and head in on foot; he wasn’t taking any chances, and if someone spotted a Resistance fighter on a First Order planet, they would _really_ be in trouble.

Finn, in the instructor’s seat behind him, was staring out of the window and frowning. Mainland Galtuulan was beautiful - in a sleek, sneering sort of way. The planet itself was mostly ocean, its waters black and pockmarked by clusters of reddish volcanic islands which had forced themselves up from the depths. The mainland was lush - fields bursting with crops, the earth dark and rich beneath them. Dotted haphazardly over the plains, tangled forests crawled up the sides of the great jagged red pillars of rock, black waterfalls tumbling down the sides to feed into the rivers snaking towards the sea. Upriver, the city was a graceful collection of towers and spires, white rock and gleaming metal, lustrous against the dull red and black landscape.

“I can see why the First Order like this place,” said Poe, dryly. “It matches their colour scheme.”

“I don’t like this,” said Finn. “I really don’t like this.” BB-8 warbled agreement.

“Yeah, me neither, buddy.” Poe throttled down in the overhang of one of the rock spires, deep enough in the trees that the A-wing wouldn’t be spotted by a casual observer. “But we don’t have a whole lot of choice. The sooner we get into the city, the more-“

“We’re going into the city?” Finn stopped struggling with the straps of his seat. “Into the city? The city full of First Order?”

“The whole idea of this is to get you to somewhere where they won’t be able to find you,” Poe reminded him, climbing down from the cockpit as the flight systems powered down. “The more First Order, the better.”

“But we could be recognised! I thought we were just going to hide out somewhere on the planet, not go marching straight into a crowd of stormtroopers and officers on shore leave,” Finn protested. 

“Huh. Stormtroopers get shore leave?” 

“ _Officers_ on shore leave. Stormtroopers don’t leave the ship unless they’re ordered to.”

“So you’ve never been here before?”

“No, of course I haven’t!” Finn was on edge. “We’re really going to go into the city?”

“Yeah. And if you’ve never been here before, how are they gonna recognise you? Which reminds me, you can’t go around wearing those clothes,” he said, reaching up into the cockpit again while Finn climbed down. He found Finn’s bag - well, his bag, technically - and checked inside it. “Good, you brought your old ones. I wasn’t sure the ones they found for us were gonna fit.” He dropped both bags onto the ground.

Finn stared up at him, hunching into his jacket self-consciously. 

“We’re really gonna go into the city,” he said, disbelievingly. “Really.”

Poe jumped down and clapped him on the shoulder. “Yeah. But it’ll be fine. And you’re gonna have to leave your jacket, I don’t wanna have to sew it up again if we get shot.” 

Finn almost choked. 

“It was a joke, buddy,” said Poe. “No-one’s getting shot. It’ll be alright. We’re gonna just lie low and not draw attention to ourselves, until the Resistance’ll jump to hyperspace and then we can go find ‘em. It’s not like this is a war zone, no-one’s gonna be looking for us here.”

Unless the plan didn’t work and the First Order found them in a city full of Stormtroopers. Or unless someone _told_ them where to come. 

He glanced over at Finn, who had turned away as he pulled off his shirt. The scar running down his back - from shoulder to hip - was still raised and raw. It looked painful. He realised again how truly close to death Finn had been.

No, he couldn’t be a traitor.

But then how had the First Order tracked them - followed them, in fact, to every place Finn had been? Jakku, Takodana, D’Qar… even found them after a hyperspeed jump. General Organa had been right - Finn was the only thing in common. If they had somehow implanted a tracking device into him without him knowing… but then how did they know that he would rescue Poe and join the Resistance? They couldn’t have planned it without him knowing, could they? 

And if they could, what else had they planned?

 

* * *

 

Rey burst into Luke’s hut, breathing hard.

“Luke, I- I don’t know what just happened, I didn’t mean for it to, but- I don’t know how, he was in my head, I could hear his voice, I didn’t want him there, I just…” She let out a sob, and then another. 

Luke looked startled, and then a look of alarm crossed his face. “Who was in your head?”

“Kylo Ren! I could hear his voice, he talked to me - I was just on the cliff, and he could tell… he could tell that I was upset-“

Luke had risen from his seat; he was gripping her tightly, on both arms, his metal fingers pressing into her skin. “What did he say? Did you speak to him?”

“I - I- Yes, I think so. I called him a murderer. I told him to get out of my head.”

“And what did he say?”

“He said that he couldn’t-“ She sobbed again, trying to slow down her breathing, trying to calm down. “He said that he couldn’t see where I was. That he could hear me but he couldn’t see me. He said that I was upset. And angry.”

Luke relaxed. “Good.”

A flicker of anger rose up again. “ _Good_?”

“Yes, _good_.” Luke frowned at her. “He doesn’t know where you are. He can’t find us.”

“But he was _in my head_.”

“Yes,” he said, thoughtfully. “I wouldn’t have thought that he was strong enough to manage it. Especially from so far away.”

“He tried it before,” she said. “On Starkiller Base. He tried to get into my mind. But I- I did it back to him, instead.”

“Hm.” Luke moved back to his seat by the fire and frowned down at it. “I had hoped…” He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter now. I see now that I will have to teach you one thing, at least.”

“You’re going to train me?” she said, surprised. “To be a Jedi?”

_“No_.” He whipped his head up to glare at her. “Didn’t you listen to _anything_ I said in the Temple? The Jedi are finished.”

“Then what-“

“Do you know why you found me? Why I left that map with R2?” He sounded frustrated. “In case someone like _you_ appeared. I programmed him to reactivate only when he found a Force-user powerful enough to be dangerous. Someone new, someone strong enough to disrupt the balance again. I hoped that I could die alone on this island - but I knew that if it happened, I would have to leave a way for you to get to me.”

“So that you could train me,” said Rey.

“So that I could teach you what I spent years training myself to do. Close yourself off from the Force.” Luke shut his eyes, his head bowed. “I had hoped I might have been mistaken. That you had found me some other way.”

“You closed yourself off from the Force?” Rey echoed, taken aback. She remembered the feeling it had filled her with; a sense of belonging, of balance, of _life_. She couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to cut themselves off from that. “But _why_?”

“For the same reason I came here. A Force-user - any Force-user - can too easily upset the balance. Removing myself from everything - cutting the strings - was the only way to avoid that.” 

“But I don’t want to cut myself off from everything,” she said, softly. 

“Too bad. There are people who’d tell you that that’s the Jedi way,” he said, sarcastically. “You’re too strong with the Force to go running around upsetting things you barely understand. I’m not going to let you allow Kylo Ren to pour all of Snoke’s darkness into you like you’re an empty cup waiting to become the next Sith. You’ll learn to shut it off, or you’ll let him drag you over to the dark side. And I am not,” he added, “going to let that happen.”

 

* * *

 

“You’ve lost them,” snarled Kylo Ren. “You _fool_ , you’ve lost them!”

“We have not,” Hux retorted. “They’re still stranded. They cannot jump to hyperspace. They’re running out of fuel. And they may not even have realised that the tracking device is no longer on their ship.”

“No?” Ren said. “I suppose that they managed to get rid of it by _accident,_ then?”

“It doesn’t matter,” he said, shortly. “They cannot escape.”

“Not until they recharge and jump to hyperspace!” Kylo Ren spat. “You were a fool before, and you’re even more of a fool now if still you do nothing. I am taking a squadron. _You_ may be too much of a coward to deal with this; _I_ am not.”

He strode out of the room before Hux could reply. He stared at the door as it slid shut after him. Let him take a sortie out; let him get killed. The Resistance may have been running out of time and fuel, but gung-ho pilots with their brains in their cockpits rather than their heads - that they had never been short of. Let him get shot down by some Rebel scum.

The galling thing was that this time Kylo Ren was right. He hadn’t anticipated them being so quick to realise how they were being tracked, and now all the Rebels had to do was survive until their hyperdrive was functional again. 

But that was still hours away, and they might run out of fuel before then anyway; there was plenty of time to enjoy their panic before it started to become an issue. For half a second, he wondered whether he _should_ have called in backup. He knew that there were several other high-ranking Destroyers close enough to answer a call within the hour. 

And then his throat twinged unpleasantly. It was still aching from earlier. 

No, he didn’t need backup. Nothing had really changed; he was still more than able to deal with this.

The door slid open. “Sir,” said Phasma, and saluted, her armour glinting in the lights of the consoles around them.

“Captain Phasma.” He turned towards her. “It seems that our tracking project is no longer required. I assume you still have the frequency.”

She nodded.

“It is no longer useful to us. Take a ship. Find it. Destroy it.”

 

* * *

 

The bar was dark, and the music was almost obnoxiously loud - which suited Poe perfectly. Finn was twitching like a rabbit by the time he brought their drinks to the table, glancing around at the rest of the people in the bar with anxious eyes, looking ready to bolt.

“Recognise anyone?” said Poe, casually. 

Finn pressed his lips together. “Don’t joke about it. How can you joke about it?”

Poe helped himself to a handful of whatever-it-was from the bowl in the centre of the table. “At least we’ve got food here. I feel like I haven’t eaten in days.”

“I’m not hungry,” said Finn, glancing nervously around the bar for the seventeen-millionth time. “How can you eat? We could be recognised at any moment.”

He shrugged and scooped up another handful. They weren’t too bad, all things considered - whatever they were. “Then I’d rather fight on a full stomach.” He nudged him under the table with a foot. “Come on, don’t be so jumpy. No-one here’s gonna notice us - it’s the last place you’d expect to find a Resistance pilot and a defector. We’ve just gotta lie low for a while, then we’ll head to a sympathiser cell and rendezvous with the fleet once we’ve got the all-clear.”

“ _If_ we get the all-clear. What if I _am_ being tracked? I mean… how would I know? They took me when I was just a kid. What if they did put something in me? What if it’s all my fault?” Finn stared at him with troubled eyes. “All those people might’ve died because of me.”

“Hey. Don’t blame yourself. I was the one who led them into that fight,” pointed out Poe. 

“But you guys destroyed a _dreadnought_!”

“Yeah. We did.” Poe sighed. He remembered General Organa’s anger. Had all those lives been worth it? Maybe they would’ve died anyway. Maybe the First Order would’ve destroyed the _Raddus_ if they hadn’t done it. 

And maybe they wouldn’t, and he’d led an entire squadron and a half to their deaths for nothing.

“I just hate sitting here not knowing what’s going on. Where Rey is. If she found-“ Finn stopped and glanced around at the other patrons, then lowered his voice. “You know - if she found _him_. What if she tries coming back and flies straight into the First Order?” His face twisted in distress. “Everyone I’ve ever tried to help gets in trouble.”

Poe shook himself out of his own dark thoughts. “Hey. I seem to remember you getting me _out_ of trouble.” He remembered the crash. “Well. Mostly.”

“But if there really is a tracking device-“

“Then we’ve got it away from the Fleet. That’s the most important thing. And they’ll find it on your medical scans, and then they can get rid of it.”

“I didn’t even want to join the Resistance,” said Finn, running both hands over his head. “I didn’t sign up for any of this.”

Poe stared at him. “You didn’t want to join?”

“I just wanted to be free! I didn’t want to be part of what the First Order were doing. I didn’t wanna hurt anyone. And now I’m hurting _everyone_.” Finn slumped back against his seat. “All I wanted was to protect my friends. Maybe I should just leave.”

“Probably shouldn’t have picked so many friends in the Resistance, then,” said Poe, to cover his shock. 

“Ha.” Finn smiled briefly and without much humour. “Yeah. Kind of hard to make friends when you’re a stormtrooper. They don’t like you to have too much loyalty to each other, they want it all to be to your commander and the generals. Plus there’s always a chance you’ll get sent to Reconditioning and forget it all anyway. Or, you know. They’ll get shot. Or you’ll get shot.”

“What do they do to you? In Reconditioning, I mean - how does it work?” 

Finn shrugged unhappily. “I don’t know. You never remember it, really. Just… they make you forget who you are. You’re not a person any more, you’re just some number. It’s like they can erase everything that matters about you,” he added, while Poe’s heart sank. Finn had told him that he had been sent to Reconditioning after Jakku - that he had gone to rescue Poe instead, but… 

What if he had gone, and just didn’t remember it? They might have implanted a tracker into him then - or worse. If they could make you forgot your own name, who was to say they couldn’t force you to betray your own friends, without even knowing about it?

He squashed his thoughts with difficulty. As if it mattered. What mattered was that they were safely away from the Fleet. Even if all of his worst fears were true, all Finn could do now would be to get _him_ killed. That was nothing compared to what would have happened to the Resistance otherwise. He felt the knot of anxiety in his stomach tighten at the thought of the Fleet. They would still be desperately trying to avoid complete destruction while they waited for the hyperdrives to recharge. And there was nothing he could do. His squadron, his friends… and nothing he could do to help them.

“That’s why the Resistance exists, Finn,” he said, quietly. “That’s why we fight. The First Order - they’d take all of it away. Turn people against each other. Tear families apart. Erase everything that matters. You wanna protect your friends? That’s why we fight. It’s the only way to protect what we care about.”

He’d failed in that, he realised. His decision had cost lives, not saved them. General Organa had been right; he hadn’t seen the bigger picture. He could have let her call off the bombing run, he could have told her to delay it for as long as possible. It was his poor judgement that had killed them.

“Maybe that’s all we can ever be.” He stared down at his hands. “Martyrs.”

Finn was staring at him, his expression troubled. Then he shook his head and his fist clenched. “Then what are we doing here? Sitting in some First Order bar?” He shook his head again, more violently this time. “We need to _do_ something.”

Poe frowned. “We _are_ doing something. Keeping away from the Resistance so the First Order can’t-“

“Can’t do what? We don’t even know, do we?” Finn challenged. “Well, I’m not gonna just sit here doing nothing. We’ve gotta find out what they’re doing. If I am marked, I wanna know how, and I wanna know how to get rid of it.”

“The medics are looking through your scans right now-“

“And what if they don’t find anything? I can never go back? I don’t wanna spend the rest of my life running away from stuff. Never getting attached to anything or anyone. That’s not why I left the First Order. I wanted to disappear, not run forever. I’m not just gonna sit here doing _nothing_ ,” he repeated.

“I hear you,” said Poe, a little startled by his vehemence. “But what are you gonna do? Just walk in to the nearest First Order command centre and _ask_?”

Finn deflated. Then his gaze fell on BB-8, sitting on the floor by their legs and trying to keep as much of its main unit under the table as possible. 

“No,” he said, slowly. “Not exactly.”

 

* * *

 

“I have to speak with General Organa!” Rose’s heart was thumping. She had never even been _near_ the command centre before, and she felt thoroughly out of place in her grease-stained working clothes amongst all of the glass and chrome and white walls. She didn’t want to move in case she ruined something.

“I apologise, but that is quite impossible. The Pri- The General is currently occupied,” explained the droid, glinting gold in the bright lights of the corridor. “However, I will be happy to deliver your message to her. I am well versed in-“

“No, it’s not a message, I have to _give_ something to her,” Rose said. She was well aware of the looks she was getting - standing in the corridor outside arguing with a droid, while inside the admirals and generals were frantically trying to save the entire Resistance from complete destruction. Her job seemed terribly unimportant. But she had _promised._

“Oh,” said the droid. “Well, I’m sure you’re aware that I cannot just accept gifts. The General is a busy woman, she doesn’t have time for that sort of thing.”

“It’s not a _gift,_ ” she cried. “It’s a tracking bracelet. Finn gave it to me and he told me to give it to General Organa, and-“

“Master Finn! Do you know, I had no idea that he was awake. What good news,” said the droid, cheerfully. Rose pressed her thumbs into the points of her necklace, trying to stay calm.

“Look. What I’m _trying_ to tell you is that Finn gave me this tracking bracelet to give to General Organa before he left, and so I need to give it to her, and so you need to let me in to the command centre so that I can give it to her - and then you’re happy, and she’s happy, and Finn’s happy, and _I’m_ happy, and I can go back to the mech bay and fix the dodgy power couplings on Pod Six in _peace_ ,” she said. 

“Oh!” said the droid. “I apologise, but that is quite impossible. The General is currently occupied.”

Rose resisted the urge to scream.

 

* * *

 

The anger was burning strong within him as his fighter screeched towards the Rebel ships. 

Let Hux fuss like an old woman. He would prove to Supreme Leader Snoke that there was no weakness. Not any more.

“Aim for their command centres, and their hyperdrives,” he ordered. “Cripple them before they have the chance to fight back.”

He knew where he was going. He knew where _she_ was.

He stretched out with the Force as he led his wingmen in a dive, straight for the Rebels’ flagship, under their shields. He could feel their fear, feel their panic, feel the mad scrambling rush as the alarms sounded and their pilots raced for their ships. And he could feel _her_.

He knew she felt it too. She froze, staring up at him, her soft brown eyes anxious. 

His mother’s eyes.

She didn’t want to believe it, he could tell. She was anxious not for herself, but for him. That he was so far gone that he would take the shot. She still believed that it was her son looking back at her. That Ben Solo wouldn’t murder his own mother.

His thumb was resting over the trigger. He had a clear shot. Nothing to stop him now. Nothing.

_Nothing_.

He hesitated, his thumb trembling.

_Nothing to stop me._

He took his thumb off the trigger.

Leia’s eyes cleared. 

The ship’s command centre exploded. 

“No!” Ren screamed, as his wingmen pulled up from their dive and looped around the ship, heading for another run.

“Target destroyed, commander,” reported one of them.

The Rebels were beginning to react, now, the first few X-wings swarming out from their fighter bay and streaking towards his squadron. Ren ignored them, gritting his teeth. His fighters were strafing the Rebel ship’s hyperdrive, dipping under their shields, blotches of fire erupting from where their ion cannons hit. 

Below them, the debris from the explosion of the ship’s bridge were still drifting, shards of glass and scraps of metal expanding outwards from the impact. She was gone. There was no way the Rebels could recover from this. 

“Commander Ren, what are your orders?” asked one of his wingmen. “The Rebels are sending out squadrons. Do we disengage?”

He didn’t answer. She had been _smiling,_ when the blast had hit. She had been _relieved_.

“Commander! We’re taking casualties! What are your orders?” 

A bolt hit his ship, jolting him back into himself. The damage systems were beeping at him frantically. 

“ _Commander.”_ His wingman sounded desperate. “We’re outnumbered! We’re losi-“ The explosion was bright outside his cockpit. 

Kylo Ren returned to the _Supremacy_ alone.

 

* * *

 

She hung suspended among the debris, her robes fanning out around her. A filigree of ice was already beginning to creep over her skin, growing over her hair like a strange, shimmering diadem. Her eyes were closed, a faint smile on her lips.

And then she was gone, leaving only a robe and a tracery of frost, still glittering in the light of the stars. 


	2. Chapter 2

Rose felt dizzy. She was on the ground, sprawled awkwardly up against the far wall. Her ears were ringing. Her head hurt. 

She sat up, reaching for the pendant around her neck automatically, and tried to focus her eyes. There was glass all over the floor on either side of the door. That stupid golden droid was lying at the other end of the corridor, its eyelights dim. The tracking bracelet was flashing blue-green a few inches from her hand. 

“Oh, I appear to have fallen. Clumsy of me. I’ll be with you in a moment,” said the droid. 

Rose staggered to her feet, picking up the tracking bracelet as she did, and over to the door. 

“Oh, I appear to have fallen. Clumsy of me. I’ll be with you in a moment.”

The command centre was a smoking, sparking wreck. The glass of the door had shattered outwards - _everything_ had shattered outwards. Equipment and wires and screens lay scattered around, kept in place by twisted pieces of metal or plastic attaching them to the consoles. A few bodies, crumpled up against whatever had saved them being blasted out into space. The ship’s forcefield has restored - it must have done, or she wouldn’t be able to breathe right now - but in the few brief seconds of the explosion, everything had been ripped apart.

Rose stumbled backwards.

“Oh, I appear to have fallen. Clumsy of me. I’ll be with you in a moment.”

“Shut up,” she said, vaguely. 

“Oh, I appear to have fallen. Clumsy of me. I’ll be with you in a moment.”

She switched the droid to low power and then sat down beside it, her head in her hands. It had all gone so horribly, terribly wrong.

“Leia?” 

There was a voice coming from the command centre: a woman’s voice, shaken. 

“Leia, are you there? The communication went down. We saw an explosion. What happened?”

Rose hauled herself to her feet and stumbled back to the door, wrenching it open. A blue hologram was flickering in the centre of the room - a tall woman, slim, elegant, her eyes crinkled with anxiety. 

“Leia?” she called. “Admiral Ackbar?”

Rose made it to the command console and pressed the button to open the channel. “They’re… they’re gone,” she said, her voice cracking. 

The woman turned her head. “Who are you?” she asked. “What happened?”

“Rose. Rose Tico. My sister was Paige,” she said, without really knowing why. “I’m a mechanic. There - there was an explosion. The command centre. There’s… I don’t know what happened. They’re all gone. I think they’re all dead. I don’t know. There are bodies here.” She felt the panic rising up in her. “I don’t know what to do!”

The woman’s mouth had opened in horror, but her voice was calm. “Rose. Is General Leia there? Admiral Ackbar? I need you to check.”

“Okay,” she said. She didn’t want to touch the bodies. She moved around the room, looking into each person’s face. There weren’t many of them. Some of them had their eyes still open. 

“No. They’re not here,” she said, struggling to crush down the panic again, which was threatening to spill out into sobs. 

“Are any of them still alive?” asked the woman. “Quickly now. They may need your help.”

She went around again, this time peering more closely. One of them looked like he might still be breathing, despite the blood which had freeze-dried in a maze on the side of his face. She forced herself to touch his cheek, gently. He groaned and shifted slightly. 

“Yes. One of them is,” she said. “Maybe more.”

“Rose, you need to summon the medics,” said the woman. She pressed some buttons on a console offscreen. “My name is Vice-Admiral Holdo, on the _Ninka._ I’m going to be taking command of the fleet until we can work out what happened. I need you to help me, Rose; can you do that?”

“I… I think I can do that,” she said. The console beeped acknowledgement of her request for medical assistance. “What do I do?”

“You’re a mechanic, aren’t you? Can you find me a status report of your ship?”

“Yes.” Her fingers darted across the console, searching for familiar commands. It sparked at her and she jumped. “It says… shields holding. Damage to our command centre. Damage to our crew quarters. Damage to… oh, _no_ …”

The medical crew were already approaching; she could hear them struggling to get into the corridor outside. The outer door must have locked when it had depressurised.

“Damage to- the mech bay. The hyperdrive. They’ve broken our hyperdrive!” she reported, feeling the fear bubbling up into her throat, threatening to choke her. The moon pendant was clenched hard enough in her palm for the points to bruise.

“Main engines?” asked the Admiral, swiftly.

“They’re okay. We can keep going, we just can’t make the jump at the end of it,” said Rose. “When we run out of fuel…”

“Alright. Rose, if they’ve hit your mech bay you may not have many shipboard mechanics left. I’m going to need you to take charge. I’m promoting you to Lieutenant. Find a holo bracelet so that I can contact you. Stay on course, keep accelerating. Rose, I’m sorry to have to do this to you, but there isn’t any other way. I need you to fix your hyperdrive, if you can. You’ve got until your fuel runs out.” She looked desperately sad. “May the Force be with you.” 

Rose only just caught her next words, muttered faintly to herself just before the hologram cut out.

“May it be with all of us.”

 

* * *

 

Training was _hard_.

The irony was not lost on her. After his irritation at her description of the Force and what it could be used for, Luke had set her to… lifting rocks. Little ones, at first, and then bigger ones, and then more rocks, and then balancing them on each other carefully, or lifting one while lowering another, again and again and again until she was shaking with exhaustion and her head was aching like she’d spent the whole day out on the dunes with no headcovering.

And all the while, he talked.

About the Force, and about the Jedi, and about balance. About the mistakes that the Order had made. About the wars that it had started. About the dark side users who had grown from its ranks. And every time she lost focus and the rocks tumbled, he just looked at her calmly until she rearranged herself and emptied her mind and did it again. _Control_ , he called it. _Learning control_. 

_Control_ made her want to scream.

“Again.” He wrapped a fold of his cloak around his knees. 

She sighed and closed off her mind and opened it again, letting the Force flow through her. The rocks in a circle around her lifted, arranged themselves. Smallest at the bottom, largest at the top. She began to lower them gently, trying to feel the balance point of each one.

“Tell me about your home.”

The rocks clattered to the ground. 

“Again.”

She closed and opened her mind. The rocks lifted. 

“Your home. Where is it?”

She freed a part of her mind. It didn’t have to interfere. “Jakku.”

“Hm.” Luke nodded. “A harsh planet. Tell me about it.”

“It’s sand,” she said, still focusing on the rocks. She placed the first one down, readied the second. “It’s hot. It’s dry. There’s nothing there.”

“What did you do there?”

“I was a scavenger.”

“Why did you leave?”

“Because I met BB-8, and he said he had to get to the Resistance, and Finn can’t fly,” she said. She placed another rock on top of the pile.

“Why didn’t you leave before?” 

The rocks trembled. “I was waiting.”

“Waiting? For what?”

“For my family,” she said. The rocks were trembling more now. She struggled to focus. Calm herself. The rocks steadied. She added another one to the pile.

“Where are they?”

“I don’t know.”

“Who are they?”

“I don’t know,” she repeated. There were tears running down her face, she realised, and the rocks were shaking again.

“Why did they leave?”

“I don’t know!” The pebbles cracked and tumbled to the ground in pieces. Beneath her, the rock jolted and split, scattering tiny stones everywhere. Luke leapt up, alarm on his face.

“I told you to _focus_ ,” he said. “I told you to clear your mind!” 

“I’m _trying_ ,” she retorted, through the sobs rising in her chest. “I’m trying. I just want to know. I want to know who I am. I want to know why they left me.”

“Who you are,” said Luke, “Is Rey. Your past doesn’t matter. All that matters is who you are _now.”_

“That’s easy for you to say!” she burst out. “You _have_ a past. You _have_ a family. It’s not my fault you’ve chosen to abandon them! You chose to be alone, you chose to leave! I didn’t get a choice!”

“Calm yourself. To achieve control you must be able to let go of your emotions,” he said. “It is when your emotions are strongest that it is easiest to slip.” He nodded to the rocks. “Again.”

He kept her at for hours, until she was so exhausted that she could barely speak. Then he left, without a word - and she was alone on the cliffside, surrounded by rocks and a strange, crushing weight of tiredness which had nothing to do with the aches of her muscles.

She sat and watched the sea for a while. It was oddly restful. The waves cresting and tumbling over each other, the bird-creatures darting in and out, calling to one another. Endless movement, keeping things the same. Like Jakku, only with water instead of sand. 

She became aware, suddenly, of Kylo Ren. Strangely subdued, this time, with none of the casual malevolence of before. And she… she could see him. Almost. Not _see_ him, but somehow… somehow she was aware of what she would be looking at if she _could_ see him. 

“You’re a _monster_ ,” she hissed, forgetting that the whole point of the training was that she was supposed to be trying to block this.

His head jerked up and it felt as though he met her eyes with his own. There was a long moment of silence.

_Yes_ , he said. _I am_.

The answer took her by surprise. He had changed, somehow, from the last time. Then, he had been aloof. Detached. Now… 

“Why… why did you do it? Why did you kill him, why did you do it?”

_You have to let the past die,_ he said, his voice somehow hollow. _Kill it, if you have to. Before it consumes you_. _He wasn’t the hero you want to believe._ He cocked his head. _How are you doing this?_

“I’m not doing anything!” she said. “You’re the one inside my head!”

_It appears to happen when one or both of us are feeling strong emotion_ , he noted. _I couldn’t see you before, but now I can. Can you see me?_

“Yes,” she admitted. “I don’t know how.” Curiosity overcame her. “Are you angry?”

_No_. He was, though; she could feel it. Angry and hollow and sad and confused, all rolling beneath the surface, tangled up together. Fear. Shame. Pain. She’s felt it before, when she’d accidentally broken into his mind on _Starkiller Base_ \- but then only a hint of it, only a brief glimpse. Now it was straining against his whole being, a mess of emotions threatening to break free. 

“Why? What happened?”

_Nothing_. 

“You’re lonely,” she realised, shocked. She hadn’t realised before, but it was there, a thread running deep through his mind, a warped mirror of her own. 

_I don’t fear being alone_.

“Yes you do.” She reached out, impulsively. “You don’t have to be alone,” she said, and then, because it felt right, “Ben.”

He stared at her, dark clouds forming across his face. More rain was coming in. 

“I know what it feels like,” she persisted. “I know what Snoke’s trying to do to you. Keep you hurting, so that you can’t fight him. You don’t have to let him. You have a choice.”

He narrowed his eyes, watching her. Then he reached out, slowly.

_You’re wrong about the dark side,_ he said. _It gives me strength._

His fingertips were hovering above her own. 

“You can choose not to be alone,” she said, carefully. “And then you don’t need that kind of strength.”

She was almost blasted back across the rock by the force of it. A rush of images, of feelings, of certainties. Her fingers were ripped from his. It felt like she was being swept along by a flood of it. And then she was alone, the world suddenly solid around her, her back pressed against the rocks and her heart thundering.

“What have you done?” Luke snapped, striding down the path back towards her. “What did you do?”

“I - I saw him - I saw him again - I spoke with him,” she said, the words coming out in a rush. “We- our fingers touched - I saw things, I saw things that are going to happen - he’s going to turn, Luke, I saw it!” 

“You shared another Force Link with Kylo Ren,” he growled. “Exactly the thing I have been training you all day _not_ to do.”

“But it was different this time - he was confused, he’s afraid, he’s not sure…” she said. “When our fingers touched- I _saw_ him, it was _real,_ I know he’ll turn. I know it!”

She had no idea where the rock-solid certainty came from, but it was there. Just as real as the stones around her and the sky above her and Luke, standing in front of her with a scowl on his face. She _knew_.

“Can’t you see?” he demanded. “It’s a trick. You’re being manipulated. That’s what the dark side _does_. Makes you believe that there’s an easy way, an easy solution to solve all of your problems. It seduces you, and it draws you in, until you forget where you came from and you forget how to get out, and then it uses you and discards you. That’s how the dark side works.”

“And the light side just wants you to forget who you are and where you came from and everything about yourself,” she cried, frustrated. “Just forget all of your past and your emotions and never feel _anything,_ is that it? _”_

“You haven’t been listening,” he said. “The light side isn’t about forgetting yourself or your past. It’s about acknowledging it and not letting it have mastery over you. Not letting it control you.”

“Then why can’t you?” Rey scrambled to her feet. “Why are you hiding from your own past? You’re so caught up in whatever happened that you won’t even help when people _need_ you. When people are _dying_ because of you. I know why you’re scared to train any more Jedi, but why did _you_ have to abandon the galaxy?”

He stared at her, and then moved his gaze out to sea, watching the incoming rain clouds. “You wouldn’t understand. It’s for the best.”

“The First Order is going to roll over everyone and everything if we don’t stop them!” she cried. “How is that _for the best_?”

“Because I failed!” he said. He sat down heavily on a boulder, still looking out to sea. “I failed. I tried to bring light again, I tried to help. And I failed. Kylo Ren was my student, you know that? I wasn’t sure about taking him on, but Leia persuaded me. Had the Skywalker blood in him, she said. Wanted him to be trained. I nearly said no. I could sense the conflict in him. Too much of the Skywalker blood. Too much of my father.”

He sighed, deep and wearily. “I tried to train him. Tried to teach him the ways of the light. Tried to teach him to resist the call of the dark side. But something kept pulling him back. Pulling him away from me.”

“Supreme Leader Snoke,” said Rey, softly. Luke turned watery eyes on her. 

“Perhaps. Something was corrupting him from within. Perhaps Snoke found an opportunity to gain a foothold. Kept twisting him, tormenting him. I didn’t know how to help him. I could see what was happening, and I couldn’t stop it.”

He looked back out to sea. “I confronted him. One evening, I sent the other Younglings to bed, and I summoned him into the Sanctum, and I confronted him about Snoke. About what he was letting into his mind. The darkness. I told him I wanted to help him.” He shook his head. “Perhaps I should have done it earlier. He was already too far gone.”

“What happened?”

“He pulled the temple down around us. I don’t think he fully understood what he was doing. I tried to hold it up - I could have dropped it, I could have killed us both… but I let him run. By the time I climbed out of the rubble, the entire Sanctuary was burning. He thought he’d killed me. He took some of the Younglings with him. The rest died in the fire.” 

“It… it wasn’t your fault,” said Rey. “It was Snoke-“

“I failed him,” said Luke, cutting her off. “I was his teacher; he was my responsibility. Han and Leia trusted me. And I failed him.” 

“No.” Rey shook her head. “He failed _you_. I won’t.”

“It’s too late, Rey,” he said, his voice infinitely weary. “I failed. I won’t fail again. The cost would be too high.”

“You’re wrong,” she said. “If you abandon everyone - that’s failing. Refusing to even try is failing! You can make it right again. If you come back. You can make it right.” 

“No, Rey.” He turned away, pulling his hood up over his face. “I can’t.”

 

* * *

 

“I would like to say now,” whispered Poe, “that I think that this is a horrible idea.”

“You think we shouldn’t do it? You think it’s too dangerous?” Finn stopped to glance back at him. 

Poe was grinning. “Did I say that? We’re gonna do this,” he said. 

“Yeah?” Finn nodded. “Yeah! We are.”

“Just like old times, buddy.”

“You mean last month.” Finn wasn’t completely sure how long it had been since they’d escaped the Star Destroyer. He had a feeling he hadn’t slept nearly enough since then.

“Yeah. But without getting shot at and crash-landing in the middle of a desert this time.”

The First Order databanks were housed in one of the central spires of the citadel. It was late evening by now, the sun sinking blood-red over the black ocean on the horizon, and the corridors were quiet. White stone and seamless black tiles, columns of polished red marble arching overhead. The building felt oddly familiar to Finn, and he realised that it reminded him of a Star Destroyer - the same clean simplicity, sharp angles, polished floors.

A few months ago, the uncomplicated, smooth practicality of it would have been comforting. Now it unnerved him.

“Come on,” said Poe, darting out from behind their column and into the centre of the corridor. BB-8 whirred after him, its scope darting from left to right. Finn followed, uncomfortable in the stolen uniform they’d managed to find in an unattended supply depot. No wonder the officers were so uptight all the time, if they had to wear this. 

They walked briskly along the corridor, his heart pounding against his chest. He wondered if Poe could hear it. He wondered if the whole world could hear it. Why had he thought that this would be a good idea, again?

Relax, relax. He had to stay calm. That was the trick. To look like you knew you belonged. 

A junior officer turned a corner ahead of them and began walking towards them. Finn tried desperately not to notice her. _Just walk past, just walk past, she doesn’t know you, she thinks you’re supposed to be here…_ His stomach grumbled and he fought the impulse to curl up in on himself and hide, or maybe just bolt. If he tripped her up he’d probably be able to make it to the other end of the corridor before she recovered-

She passed them without a second glance and he breathed again, pressing his fingers against his thumbs to stop them from trembling. This was awful. Any moment now, someone was going to notice them and-

BB-8 chirped softly. 

“Yep,” said Poe, and turned down another corridor, walking even more quickly than before. “He says the dataport is just up ahead. Should be one of the least busy ones in the building, it’s far enough away from the main archive banks,” he murmured, once they were sure the corridor was empty. “Nearly there. You can breathe, if you want,” he added, glancing back. “Don’t pass out. That probably _will_ draw attention.”

They reached an alcove with a dataport nestled in it, the screen idling. Poe retrieved the passcard they’d pickpocketed from an officer and swiped it. “Let’s see what kind of access our friend in the bar had,” he muttered, as the screen flickered into life, and then grinned briefly. “Okay, BB, your time to shine.”

Finn glanced up and down the corridor nervously as BB-8 plugged into the port and Poe hunched over the screen, scanning the files he was bringing up. His pulse was racing, almost too loud to hear anything else. It felt like it was taking eternity.

“Has he found anything?” he said. 

Poe frowned. “No, not yet. Wait. That last file, BB-8, check that.” He hunched over the screen. “Whoa.”

“What?” Finn checked the corridor again. He wished they’d hurry up.

“Take a look for yourself,” said Poe, pointing. Finn scanned the screen as fast as he could. Stormtrooper numbers, dates of birth, evaluation scores… he wasn’t sure what he was looking at. And then he spotted it. _Tracking ID_. _Signal frequency._

“For _every_ stormtrooper?” he gasped, horrified. “All of us?” 

“Looks like it,” said Poe, his face grim. “Okay, BB-8, we need more. Try to find out what they do and how we can get rid of it. And run a scan for Finn. If we know his frequency we can try jamming it, right?”

BB-8 chirruped, still running through datafiles on the screen.

“FN… uh. Buddy, what was your number again?”

“FN-2187,” said Finn, the words bitter in his mouth. 

“That’s it. Get the frequency.” Poe glanced down the corridor. “We still good?”

Finn didn’t _feel_ good. His palms were sweating. “We can’t stay much longer,” he said. 

“Nah, we’re good, buddy, we’re fine.” Poe returned his attention to the screen. “Looks like it’s an implant chip. Under a rib, or something. It’s got… what is that? Some kind of cloaking tech to hide it from med scanners. Huh.” 

Finn fidgeted. “Is that enough? Can we go now?”

“Yeah, I think we’ve got-“ BB-8 suddenly shrilled and flashed something rapidly. Poe’s eyebrows shot up. “You’ve found _what_?”

BB-8 beeped a rapid stream of Binary. It seemed excited. It was loud when it was excited.

“BB, please,” hissed Finn. “Do you want to get us all killed?”

“Whoa. Okay. Whoa. Yeah. All of it. Take all of it. As much as you can fit,” said Poe, and then glanced at him. “Looks like our officer friend was involved in some pretty high-clearance stuff,” he said, his eyes bright, and then turned back to the console. “Oh, the General is gonna _love_ this.”

Finn felt a jolt of fear. He could hear footsteps. Coming closer. And voices. “Poe,” he whispered. “We’re in trouble.”

Poe glanced back at him. “A few more seconds, Finn.”

“No, Poe, we’re in trouble _now_.” A pair of officers turned down their corridor a second later, deep in conversation. Finn backed against the wall, hoping the fear wasn’t showing on his face. The officers were getting closer, still talking, but any moment they would notice, they would see them, they would throw them in a cell or maybe just end it then and there with a nice, clean blaster shot to the back of the neck-

Poe trod on his toe sharply. “When was it the general said he wanted these reports by?” he asked, casually, without looking up from the console. 

“Uh-“ Finn managed. The officers were getting closer. He turned away from them with an effort. “Uh, next week. I think. Or next month. Uh. Before the… before he gets the other reports. You know. That the others… are… doing.”

The footsteps echoed away from them down the hall. The officers were laughing about something. Completely ignoring them. They hadn’t noticed. They went through the door at the end of the corridor, and it hissed as it slid shut.

BB-8 disconnected from the port and burbled happily. “Good work, buddy,” said Poe. His looked excited, although he was trying to contain it. He took Finn’s arm. “New plan. We’re going back to the ship.” 

 

* * *

 

The Falcon was silent, other than the muffled sounds of the rain outside lashing against the windows. Chewbacca was sitting under the engine, roasting one of the bird-things on a stick. He was surrounded by a little circle of its comrades, nestling as close to the fire as they dared. Occasionally, he took a break from his meat to briefly scatter them with a quiet roar, but they kept coming back.

Luke walked straight up the open ramp to the Falcon without the wookie even noticing, his cloak blending in with the night and the rain. It was dark in the ship, only the pilot lights still glowing. He went to the cockpit first, to sit in Han’s old seat and think. His dice were still hanging above the console, the gold plating glinting dully in the rain-soaked moonlight.

He sighed. Rey was difficult, and stubborn, and headstrong. That didn’t mean she wasn’t _right_. Perhaps he was wrong about not training her.

He got up, restless, and was startled by a whirring sound as he stepped into the main bay. In the corner, a round light lit up and flashed.

“R2!” He hadn’t realised that the old droid was actually on the island, let alone still on the ship. “It’s good to see you, old friend.”

R2 whistled and beeped a reply. 

“No, I’m not coming back.”

Another, rapid series of whistles. 

“Yes, I know Leia said to bring me-“

R2 had started rocking back and forth in its excitement, its lights flashing violently. 

“I’m not coming back, R2. The Jedi are finished. I’m finished. You can’t persuade me, I’m not coming.”

“ _Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You’re my only hope_.”

“Oh. Oh no. R2.”

The hologram of Leia flickered. “ _General Kenobi. Years ago, you served my father in the Clone Wars-_ “

“Low blow, R2,” muttered Luke, as the hologram continued to play. “Low blow.”

 

* * *

 

They hurried down the steps of the First Order databank as fast as was decent, and then Poe ducked into the nearest alleyway and pulled Finn with him. 

“Are you crazy?” hissed Finn. “We can’t go back to the ship! They’re still tracking me. If we go back we’ll lead the First Order right to us!”

Poe’s mind was still racing. At least he knew now that it wasn’t just Finn - that all stormtroopers were fitted with tracking devices. Damn the First Order. But - if all of them had it, how could Finn not have known about it? The files hadn’t even been particularly high-clearance - at least, those ones hadn’t. And if he _had_ known, why hadn’t he said? What if he was just leading Poe into another trap?

Finn wouldn’t do that. He just wanted to protect his friends. He wouldn’t betray them. Poe was sure of it. He was _sure_.

Finn must have had friends in the First Order, too. And he _had_ betrayed them.

“Trust me, this intel is gonna be worth it,” he said, instead of voicing his thoughts. “But you’re right - before we go anywhere, we need to disable your tracker. BB, buddy, you’ve got the frequency? Can you send a jamming signal?”

The little droid warbled to itself, its light dimming briefly as it processed something internally. Then it chirped. 

“Yeah?” Poe took Finn’s arm. “Finn, you’re gonna have to stick with BB. He can only jam your signal if you’re close to him. Once we get back to the ship we’ll get them to take it out or something, but until then-“

“FN-2187.” A metallic voice echoed down the alley and Finn jerked around, his eyes wide. “We meet again.”

Poe threw himself forwards into a roll as blaster bolts shattered into the alley around them, and ducked behind a stack of boxes. Finn slammed down beside him as BB-8 came whirring and screeching towards them. Poe unhooked the blaster pistol at his waist and checked it.

“Who the hell was that?” he demanded.

“Captain Phasma,” Finn panted. “My unit commander.”

“Your unit commander,” said Poe, ducking as another blaster bolt hit the wall above them, “is not a very nice person.”

“You’re telling me.” Finn ducked his head around the boxes briefly. “There are six of them. Five stormtroopers and her.”

“Your friends have extremely bad timing,” said Poe, aiming a shot above the boxes. “ _Language_ , BB-8.”

“I need a blaster,” moaned Finn. “Why didn’t I take a blaster?”

“We need to lose them,” said Poe. “We need to get back to the ship.”

“No, wait, if we go back to the ship they’ll just follow us,” said Finn. “We should find a place to hide, wait it out-“

“Yeah, maybe we should discuss this later.” Poe aimed another shot, and it pinged off the metal captain’s armour. He nodded to the other side of the alleyway, where it joined another street leading off into the city. “Over there. Take BB-8. I’ll cover you.”

Finn looked to the street, back at him, and then at the stormtroopers who were slowly advancing towards them. He nodded.

Poe focused on his aim. Blaster pistol shot didn’t do much against Stormtrooper armour, but every armour had its weak spot… One of the stormtroopers went down, and Finn and BB-8 were on the other side of the alleyway. 

He darted out from behind the boxes, running hard while the blaster bolts crashed around him, and didn’t stop to wait on the other side. They sprinted down the street, following BB-8 - first down one alley, then another corner, then another one, twisting and turning, trying to dodge blaster fire as it exploded boxes and crates and closed-up market stalls around them-

A sudden streak of pain in his left leg made him stumble, skidding and crashing down onto the floor before he could recover. Ahead of him, he saw Finn glance back.

“Come on!” he yelled, running back towards him, making beckoning gestures with his hand, his face lit by blaster shot. Poe somehow heaved himself back onto his feet to stagger onwards.

Pain jolted up his leg with every step. At least he could still run on it.

They reached the other side of the street and Finn darted into a side alley, followed closely by BB-8. Poe ducked instinctively as another blast exploded into the wall above him, not bothering to look back to aim his answering shot. Finn had paused. 

“You alright? Poe, are you alright?”

“Trust me to find the one Stormtrooper in the galaxy with decent aim,” he said, grimacing. He caught the look on Finn’s face and regretted it.

The alley opened into another wide street, with little cover, flanked by the river running black and fast on one side and a row of shops on the other. There was a bridge a little further upstream, arching cleanly above the water. Finn was already heading for it. 

“BB-8, you go - go to the other side of the river, don’t wait for us, we’ll find you downstream. You go as fast as you can, little buddy. I’ll see you soon,” said Poe, pointing. Finn was waiting for him by the bridge, and he looked confused as the droid whizzed past at full speed. 

“What’re you-?”

Poe grabbed his arm. “Come on.”

Finn realised what he meant and ripped his arm free. “No- no! Poe, wait, I can’t-“

A blaster shot hit the bridge just behind them. He didn’t stop to listen to Finn’s excuses; he had already vaulted over the rail and into the water. It was cold enough to steal the breath from him, silver bubbles escaping in front of his eyes. He struck upwards towards the surface, just in time to see Finn’s splash beside him. 

He fought the current, gasping air back into his lungs, and then Finn broke the surface and lunged for him.

Poe didn’t even have time to react before his head was pushed below the water, sudden panic twisting through his chest as Finn’s weight pressed down on both shoulders. His mouth had filled with water and the pain was shooting through his leg as he tried to wrench himself free. The black water was illuminated by the red light of blaster shots, reflecting off the bubbles of the last of his air as he struggled.

_He was going to die._

He managed to break the surface and choked in a ragged gasp that was half air, half water before Finn pushed him under again, clinging around his neck with terrifying strength. The panic was screaming through him now, blind fear and confusion. He lashed out and caught something solid. Finn let go.

Poe clawed his way back to the surface, coughing and choking in air, the wet hair in his eyes making it difficult to see, adrenaline still singing through his veins. 

Finn was gasping and thrashing in the water, his face upturned and his eyes wide. He saw Poe and reached for him again. Poe caught his arm instead, before he could drag him under a third time. 

“What the hell-?” he demanded.

“I - I can’t-“ Finn gurgled, and then his head dipped under the water, his arm jerking. He broke the surface again, coughing. “Can’t - Poe, help, I can’t-“

He went under again, and beneath the surface one of his flailing legs connected with Poe’s, sending another shock of pain up from his thigh. Finn’s other arm came up to grip Poe’s shoulder, dragging him under again. He kicked upwards, desperately, and they broke the surface together.

“Can’t-” gasped Finn, before they went under again, with Poe fighting to stop them both being dragged down to the riverbed. The current was strong, tumbling them along, and trying to struggle against both it and Finn’s weight was too much. He kicked out at him, hard. 

Finn let go and sank like a stone. Poe dragged him up by one arm and then caught him around the shoulders, keeping his face above water. Finn struggled for a few seconds more before he realised he was no longer sinking. He clung on to Poe’s arm with both hands, spluttering. 

They were already far downriver from where they had jumped in. There was no way Phasma and her troopers could have kept up with them, not unless they had followed them into the river. Poe struck out for shore with one arm, ignoring the pain in his leg and Finn’s shuddering gasps for air against his chest. 

He heaved them up onto a jetty, leaving Finn still choking and coughing up water while he dragged off his pistol strap and wrapped it around the wound in his leg. The blast had hit him squarely on his left thigh, the flesh raw and blackened where it had gone in, blood already welling up. It didn’t look too bad - at least, it hadn’t hit a major vessel, or he would have passed out by now. Painful, but not life-threatening. He hoped.

Finn had rolled onto his side, panting. “Why did you have to do that?” he demanded, looking more wretched than angry. 

“What the-? What the hell do you think you were doing? You almost killed me!”

“ _I_ almost killed _you_? I’m not the one who jumped into a raging _river_ -“

“And you would rather stay there for the First Order to kill us? That street was _wide open_ -” 

“But I _can’t swim_ , Poe!” 

Poe blinked at him. “You… can’t swim.”

“What, you think Star Destroyers have _swimming pools_?” Finn said incredulously. “Of _course_ I can’t swim.”

Poe was saved from replying by BB-8, who had arrived on the wall above the jetty and begun beeping furiously at them.

“Yeah, alright buddy, we’re coming,” he said, pushing himself up unsteadily. “We’ve gotta move.”

“Are you hurt? Is it bad?” said Finn, staring at the strapping wrapped around his thigh. 

“We’ve gotta move,” he repeated, ignoring both the question and the pain as he began climbing back up to street level. 

“But-“

Poe was already up onto the street, scanning the crowds for any sign of troopers on duty while he waited for Finn to climb up after him. His soaked clothes and bloody leg were getting him a few odd looks - and he knew that if they stayed much longer, they would be in trouble. He was shaken. Not just the pain, or leftover adrenaline from the chase and the river. For a moment there, he’d really believed that Finn had been trying to push him under.

“We need to get back to the ship,” he said. “Come on.”

He set off after BB-8, trying not to limp too obviously. Finn followed at a half-jog, catching his arm.

“It looks like a shortcut over-“

“No.” Poe didn’t bother to look where he was pointing. “We follow BB-8.”

Finn let go of his arm, but didn’t argue. They hurried onwards, trying to ignore the startled looks of the men and women on their way to late-night engagements or heading home after a long shift. Poe’s leg was hurting more and more, and he saw Finn glancing at him more and more often, the worry plain on his face. Worry about what? About him? About Phasma? Or about the fact that they were getting closer and closer to escaping with the stolen databank?

They ducked into another alleyway, BB-8 speeding up as they left the main streets behind, and Poe tried to break into a jog to follow him. His leg burst into a fresh, bright wave of pain and he stumbled against a wall. Finn rushed to catch him under the elbow as BB-8 hurtled back with a flood of anxious Binary.

“I’m alright, buddy,” Poe told him. “Keep going. It’s just my leg, it’s not too bad.” BB-8 chirped and burbled another question. “No, I’ll bandage it properly back on the ship.”

“Poe, we should stop, you-“ chipped in Finn.

“No. We don’t have time.” Poe pushed himself away from the wall. “Keep going.”

Another alleyway, and another. BB-8 was leading them through a warren of backstreets and side-alleys, weaving around abandoned boxes and refuse scattered on the streets, its main unit rumbling on the stone paving. At least it would make it hard for Phasma and the others to find them, but his leg was aching worse with every step and despite his words, he wasn’t sure he was going to make it much further without stopping. 

They reached an intersection and paused while BB-8 checked that it was clear. He took the opportunity to lean against a wall, closing his eyes in an attempt to master the pain. 

“We’re good, Poe,” said Finn, trying to hook an arm under his shoulders to help him forwards. Poe shook him off, knocking his leg in the process and having to grab onto the edge of a box hastily to prevent himself collapsing completely. Finn steadied him and then went to peer at the wound.

“It’s _fine_ ,” said Poe.

“You’re hurt.” Finn moved to tighten the strapping, his voice strained. “I just need to-”

He pushed his hands away. “Finn, just - just leave it.”

“I’m trying to _help_ you.” Finn stood up, his voice rising with frustration. “Why are you being like this? Why won’t you let me help?”

“Because I can’t trust you!” 

He regretted them almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth. 

Finn froze, staring at him. “What?”

“Why did you rescue me? From the First Order ship, why didn’t they kill me?” It was all tumbling out now, all of the niggling suspicions he had desperately been trying to ignore. “Why did you help me? Did you know they were tracking you? Did they let you go? Did they send you? Is that why you were trying to steal an escape pod?”

Finn’s face had crumpled. Poe saw the hurt in his eyes as he stumbled a few steps back, staring at him. 

“You… you really think I’m a traitor?”

“No! Maybe. No. I don’t know,” he admitted. “I don’t know any more. I thought I was sure but…”

“I’m not-“ Finn choked the words out, shaking his head. “I’m not a traitor. Poe, you’ve gotta believe me. I’m - I’m not a traitor. I’m not!”

He felt a strange surge of anger. At Finn, at the First Order. At the whole damn city - the whole damn beautiful rotten planet, so lush and so productive and feeding a regime of such darkness. At everything. At himself. “You _are_ a traitor, Finn. I’m just trying to work out which side.”

Finn flinched like he’d slapped him. For a moment, he looked like he was about to say something, to defend himself, to protest. 

Then he turned and ran.

Poe was alone. 

 

* * *

 

It was a cry - choking, raw, tearing, thrashing _,_ full of pain and loss and hopeless misery. She felt it more than she heard it - wasn’t even sure it was a sound, or whether it was just a _thing_ , bubbling up from her chest and filling her mind with pain. 

And it came from Luke. 

She knew, because she could _feel_ it. She could sense him, somehow, in a space in the back of her mind she’d never even realised she had. And she could feel the grief rolling off him, bursting against her mind like the waves battering the cliffs on the shore. 

She found him sitting on a rock near the Falcon. Chewie was staring at him, moaning softly. Luke’s head was bowed, but she could still feel the despair coiling up inside him, the tearing holes it had left in him, the sheer, enormous cold weight of it. 

“Leia’s gone,” he said. “They’re both dead.” 

She jerked to a stop. “General Organa? She - she’s not- She sent me here, she can’t be-“

“She’s _gone_ ,” he said. “I’ve been a fool. I thought… I tried to come back. But it’s all ashes. Just pain and nothing else. And now I can’t… I don’t have the strength to block it out again.”

He turned his head, and she could see the tears rolling down his cheeks, the anguish etched in every line of his face. 

“I failed them,” he said, simply.

She didn’t know what to say. His grief was overwhelming enough that she couldn’t say anything. The waves crashed against the landing stage, and the wind tore at the fabric of her clothes, and the rain trickled down from her hair onto her skin. For a long time, he sat in silence.

“You haven’t failed them yet,” she said, softly. 

He turned his face away again. “I failed them a long time ago. There’s nothing anyone can do to change that.”

“You _can_ ,” she insisted. “Come with me. Come back to the Resistance. They need us, now, more than ever.”

“No.” 

“Kylo Ren still has good in him, I know it.”

“You’re being manipulated, Rey. You’re letting him cloud your mind. Don’t make the mistakes I did.”

“I’m going. The Resistance needs us. Come with me. You can make it right again,” she said.

“I failed them,” he repeated. “I tried and I failed.” He shut his eyes, turned his face upwards into the rain. “I won’t try again.”

“I’m going. I’m leaving. If you won’t help, I will!”

“This is not going to go how you think,” he said, low and savage, whipping his head back around to glare at her with reddened eyes. “You’re a fool if you trust in him.”

“I trust in _myself_ ,” she countered. “The only person I always could.” She ran up the ramp, and Chewie followed her, still rumbling unhappily as he looked back. He stretched out a shaggy arm beseechingly.

“ _No_ ,” said Luke. 

Rey paused, looked back at him. Luke Skywalker stared back, his face heavy with grief and despair and weary resignation.

“I wanted to trust in you, too,” she said, and turned back to the ship.

 

* * *

 

He ran without really seeing where he was going, just looking for somewhere away from… from everything. He stopped by an alleyway and leaned against the wall, breathing hard. Trying not to see the look in Poe’s eyes as he’d said-

He wasn’t a traitor. He _wasn’t_. He hated the First Order, body and soul, and now…

Now he’d led them straight to the only people he’d ever thought of as friends. Now he’d caused the deaths of hundreds of Resistance fighters. Maybe even General Organa herself, if the Fleet didn’t escape. Poe had been right. He _was_ a traitor, whether he’d meant to be or not. 

And he’d never be free of them. He hadn’t thought, but he couldn’t go back to the Resistance, to Poe - not now, not knowing what he’d done. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t known. And without the Resistance, who would be willing to help a deserter enough to risk trying to remove the tracker? The First Order would be able to follow him for the rest of his life. Even if they decided he was no longer important enough to pursue, he’d still be looking over his shoulder every day, wondering if today was the day-

Blaster fire. 

He could hear blaster fire.

He ran. As he got closer, he began to make out the voices. Crackled orders, over Stormtrooper comms systems.

“Resistance scum. Surrender or die.”

Phasma. 

He grabbed the blaster pistol from his waist and slowed down before he reached the corner. In the brief glance before he had to duck his head back behind the building, he saw Poe, half-lying behind some boxes, his leg stuck out awkwardly as he clutched his blaster. BB-8 was on the opposite side of the alleyway, beeping furiously. 

In the centre of the alley, Phasma was standing, her armour glinting in the neon lights. She was flanked by four stormtroopers, all armed. 

“The Resistance will not be intimidated by you!” called Poe, panting, from behind the boxes. 

“The Resistance,” said Phasma, “dies today.”

“BB-8, buddy, you gotta get to the ship. You gotta get those databanks back to the General,” said Poe. “Send a transmission. Don’t worry about me, just go! I’ll cover you - go!”

There was a moment of silence, then blaster fire and a metallic screech. Finn used the confusion to dash from his hiding place and throw himself down beside Poe, who had let out an anguished cry.

BB-8 rolled lazily in a circle in the centre of the alleyway, blue sparks still crusting over the droid’s main unit. The light in its scope was flickering, dim, as it slowly rolled to a stop, its head hitting the paving of the street with a heavy clunk. 

Poe was wide-eyed with horror. He had hit two of the stormtroopers with his covering fire - and by the blaster marks on the boxes and the wall behind him, had barely missed being killed himself. 

“No,” he said, hoarsely, and then tried to pull himself further up against the box, grimacing with pain. 

Finn stood up. The stormtroopers’ moment of surprise was enough for him and Poe to take them out - but when he fired again, the shot glanced off Phasma’s armour with a metallic ping.

“Phasma!” he screamed. 

“FN-2187.” She wasn’t even carrying a blaster; she had clearly been expecting her subordinates to do the job for her. Somehow, that made him hate her even more. He picked up a long metal pole from the boxes and strode forwards to stand over where BB-8 had fallen.

“Finn, no, don’t-“ said Poe, his voice rough.

“It will be my pleasure to execute you, traitor,” said Phasma, smoothly, removing her vibroblade and activating it. “A blaster would have been too good for you.”

“The trash compactor was too good for you,” said Finn, and launched himself at her. 

She reacted quickly, swinging the blade up. All of his muscles jerked as the impact travelled down through his pole and threw him backwards, cracking his arm against something solid, his limbs tingling. 

Phasma strode forwards, ignoring the blaster pistol shots pinging off her armour. He struggled to get to his feet, his legs unsteady and refusing to obey him - and then had to roll out of the way as she brought the weapon crashing down where he had been seconds before. He felt his hand connect with something and swung it around to smash into her leg, giving himself time to scramble out of reach of her vibroblade and stand up. 

The thing in his hands was some kind of broken tool - a wrench, or something similar. He brought it up high to block Phasma’s next swing, catching the haft of her weapon rather than the blade this time, using all of his strength to resist hers. 

Their faces were inches apart. He wondered what she looked like. He had never seen her without her helmet. 

She tried to kick one of his legs out from under him as he moved to twist around and duck under her weapon. He went down even as he shattered the wrench against her side, and kept rolling. He spotted the pole lying close by and lunged for it, hearing the vibroblade smashing against the ground beside him, and scrambled back to his feet.

They traded a flurry of blows. He focused on dodging her blade, rather than risking blocking it - getting in as many hits as he could on her arms, her legs, her helmet. If they were affecting her, she didn’t show it. She just kept striding forwards, swinging the blade with brutal strength, implacable and unstoppable. 

Another unlucky blow connected with her blade and he was blasted backwards again, hitting the wall hard enough to daze him. He struggled to get back to his feet, aware of Phasma still advancing, the blue glow of her blade above him-

She stumbled, the blade dipping, red sparks skidding off the armour of her leg. Behind her, Finn was dimly aware of Poe, slumping beside one of the fallen troopers, clutching a First Order blaster, his face chalk-white. Finn lunged forwards towards Phasma before she could recover fully, his shoulder crashing into her armour, shoving down hard on the haft of her vibroblade.

If she’d been expecting it, he would have been dead. As it was, the moment of shock was enough for him to stamp downwards on it again, and the weapon was ripped from her hand. They both dived to pick it up.

He got there first, and swung it has hard as he could in an arc. His arms jolted as it sank into her armour. 

She didn’t make a sound. Just looked down at the haft of the blade, slowly, and then back up at him. For a moment, he thought she was going to pull it out. 

“You’re scum,” she said, with venom. “And you’re going to die screaming.”

“No.” Finn jammed the vibroblade in harder. “I’m _Resistance_ scum. And I’m going to die free.”

She collapsed. 

Finn stared at her for a few seconds, breathing hard, his heart still pounding and his limbs beginning to ache as the feeling started to come back. Then he remembered himself and hurried over to Poe.

“Poe… you okay?”

“Yeah,” said Poe, hauling himself upright and accepting Finn’s hand to help him. “Yeah, I’m okay.” He looked at him for a long moment, his expression unreadable. “You came back.”

“Yeah,” said Finn. “I did.”

Poe stared at him for a few seconds more - and then dropped his gaze and staggered over to the droid, which was still sparking blue around the blaster hole in its outer shell. “BB-8? Buddy?” 

He rolled the droid over and ran his hands over the hole, wincing as the sparks danced over his fingers. Finn moved closer to look. The light on BB-8’s scope was dim, and it was making a thin, reedy whining sound.

“Is he…?”

“It’s just hardware,” said Poe, sounding like he was trying to convince himself. “His data banks are ok. I think he’ll be… we just need to get him back to the ship, fix him up…”

Finn helped him back to his feet again. The rough bandage around Poe’s leg was stained dark with blood, but he managed to stay upright as he looked around the alleyway at the bodies of the stormtroopers and Phasma. 

“You’re one hell of a Resistance fighter, Finn,” he said. Finn felt a slow smile spreading over his face. 

“Yeah,” he said. “I am.”

 

* * *

 

Rose was exhausted. Her head was still aching from the explosion, and she hadn’t been able to stop for a minute since then, let alone rest. The _Raddus_ ’ hyperdrive was a shot-out mess. At least the charge cells were intact - that was what gave Vice-Admiral Holdo enough hope to hold off on the evacuation, because it meant that if Rose _did_ manage to somehow bring the drive back online, they’d still be able to make the jump with the others.

_If_. 

She didn’t understand how any of this had happened. She was just a mechanic. And now she seemed to be trying to hold an entire ship together. People kept interrupting her to ask questions about what they were supposed to do, just because she was the one Vice-Admiral Holdo was speaking to. And she didn’t _know_. How was she supposed to know? She had enough on her hands trying to patch back together the chaos that was the mech bay. 

At least the medical teams had been there before she made it down. They had taken away the bodies. She didn’t want to think about that. She _couldn’t_ think about that. She needed to think about wiring, and fuel lines, and motivators and coupling loops and oscillators and-

\- and not the fact that they were running out of fuel, and running out of time, and she was the only person on the ship who had any idea of how to get a hyperdrive up and running - and that if she didn’t manage it, everyone was going to die.

_Don’t think about that. Think about how to improvise a new alternator linkage without tripping the bypass system. Think about whether adding the auxiliary oscillator will burn out the motivator wires too fast._

They had already lost _Vigil_ after a First Order squadron had caught the X-wings during a squadron changeover and managed to hit its engines. Now _Raddus_ was even _more_ full, because it had been the closest and so it had taken on most of the evacuees who had managed to make it out. 

And everyone was relying on her. 

She could fix the hyperdrive. She _could_. 

Vice-Admiral Holdo thought she could. She was struggling, too; trying to hold the fleet together while the First Order grew more and more bold with their sorties and their fuel reserves dwindled and the Resistance became more and more desperate. And she was just as calm and elegant and polished as she had been when Rose had first seen her. She had no idea how the woman was managing to do it.

Rose felt like a complete mess, and she didn’t have nearly as complicated a job. All she had to do was fix the hyperdrive. She twisted another pair of wires together and winced as the sparks showered over her hands. 

“Lieutenant Tico.” The holo bracelet on her wrist flickered, and a miniature Vice-Admiral Holdo was suddenly in the middle of a burnt-out power coupling. Rose shifted so that she could see her face. “They’re attacking _Ninka._ We’ve taken heavy damage. My mechanics tell me that our HDR oscillator has been completely destroyed. Do you know what that means?”

“It means you can’t get to hyperspeed,” said Rose, her heart sinking. “You’ll barely be able to make it to lightspe-”

“It means we’re not going to make it. We’re going to have to abandon ship,” said Holdo, interrupting. “I’m coming over to the _Raddus_.”

“Okay.” Rose was, in a way, relieved. Having Holdo there meant that people wouldn’t keep asking _her_ questions. 

“Lieutenant Tico, please respond. Are you there? Are you receiving?”

“I did,” she said, confused. “I am.”

“Rose, are you receiving?” Vice-Admiral Holdo looked offscreen. “There’s something wrong with the comms. If you can hear me, prepare to receive our evacuees. We have casualties.” She looked weary, but even then her back was ramrod straight. “Pray that we make it.”

 

* * *

 

Rey’s heart was slamming against her chest as she approached the _Supremacy_. She had seen what was happening, in those short few minutes after they had dropped out of hyperspeed. She had seen the Resistance Fleet. She had seen the First Order ships looming behind them. And she had made her decision.

The journey from the Falcon was brief, at least; a few minutes of roaring acceleration, the pod filled with the rumble of its thrusters firing and the stars whirling dizzyingly around and around in the inky blackness outside. Then the instant of bright blue light and a few seconds of ringing silence before the doors hissed open.

Ben was waiting for her, with an entire platoon of stormtroopers. He glanced down at her once as they put the cuffs around her wrists and hauled her out of the pod. His expression was unreadable. One of the troopers unhooked Luke’s lightsaber from her waist and held it out to him, gingerly, as if he were handling a particularly venomous snake which might rear up and strike him at any moment.

The escort left them once they were in the elevator. Rey stared at Ben, studying his face. His expression was set, frowning slightly, looking straight ahead. 

“Ben.”

He ignored her. 

“What happened, when - when… You know. I know you felt it too.”

He closed his eyes, briefly, his eyebrows dipping in a frown, and she saw his fingers tighten around the hilt of his lightsaber. 

“ _Ben_.”

“I saw your past.” He was speaking rapidly, towards the door, and he wouldn’t look at her.

“I saw your future,” said Rey, softly, “Ben. I know you’ll turn away from darkness.”

“You don’t _know_ anything,” he said, low and savage. “You hope. There’s no difference between hope and a comforting lie. It’s worse than useless.” He tilted his face towards her, just slightly. “Coming here was a mistake. And you made it because you had _hope_.”

The doors opened. 


	3. Chapter 3

“Lieutenant Tico,” Vice-Admiral Holdo called, peering among the pipes and wires and scattered equipment in the mech bay. With her long dress sweeping the floor and her elegant jewellery, she looked as out of place as Rose had felt in the command centre - but if she felt it, she wasn’t showing it.

Rose dropped down from the secondary fuel line, the wrench still in her hand. She tried to surreptitiously wipe a smear of grease off her hands onto her shirt. She must have looked like she hadn’t slept in week. She certainly felt like it.

“Status report,” said Holdo.

“I think… I think it’ll work,” she said, breathlessly. “Just once - just one jump, when we drop out of hyperspace it’ll burn out the motivator - but I think we might make it. I need to run some checks and I need to make a few tweaks, but… I think it’ll work.”

Vice-Admiral Holdo nodded. “Good. I’m going to authorise the jump now, just in case something happens to me. I’m told Admiral Statura has a good chance of recovering eventually, but there’s no-one else with the rank. How long until we can make the jump?”

“An hour? Maybe less?”

The relief dropped off Vice-Admiral Holdo’s face. “We’re on the last of our fuel reserves now. We can’t afford an hour.”

“And what… what happens when we run out?”

“We stop accelerating and the First Order catch up with us.”

“Then we have to evacuate,” said Rose, horrified. “We have to get everyone in escape pods and-“

She was shaking her head. “We’ll have no defences. The First Order will pick us off one-by-one.”

“ _Some_ of us might make it,” said Rose, feeling the tears stinging her eyes. “We can at least save _some_ people.”

“It won’t be enough.” Vice-Admiral Holdo closed her eyes. “We have no choice. We’ll send out the fighters. All of them. If they can hold off the First Order for long enough, the rest of us might have a chance.”

“But they’ll-” protested Rose. “They won’t be able to follow us to hyperspace if they’re not with the Fleet. X-wings don’t have the range-“

“Yes,” said Holdo. “I know.”

 

* * *

 

“Darkness rises, and light to meet it.” Snoke smiled, his mouth twisting horribly as he beckoned Rey closer. “So. The girl who bested Kylo Ren.” He narrowed his eyes. “The apprentice of Luke Skywalker? No… no, if he had any control over you, he would not have allowed you to come.” 

She didn’t speak. Just stared at him, with all of the hatred in her boiling up through her, as if she could tear him apart just by willing it to happen. She wished she could. She wished she could tear the entire room to pieces: the shining walkways, the red-armoured guards standing silent around the edges, the towering throne he sat on - all of it. He chucked. 

“Such _anger_. Such rage. Oh, yes, I can see why he didn’t train you.” His throat worked. “Almost too easy to forge the link. Both feeling abandoned. Both confused about who they were. Both with such longing to belong.”

Ben’s head came up. “ _You_ connected our minds?”

“The thread was already there. I merely strengthened it,” said Snoke. “I knew of your weakness. Your… indecision.” He spat the word as if it disgusted him. “I knew that you wouldn’t be able to hide if from her. And that she, child of the light, wouldn’t be able to resist her _compassion_. Her _pity_. Hoping to be the ray of light to lead you from the darkness.” 

Ben was staring at him, his face twisted as he wrestled with his emotions. Rey felt the sick lurch of horror in her stomach. Snoke seemed to know everything.

“Everything has happened as I have foreseen. You, foolish child, have come straight to me. And through you, I will have Skywalker. The last of the Jedi will be destroyed.”

He stretched out a hand towards, her, fingers gnarled and wasted and grey with age.

“No,” whispered Rey.

He was - he was inside her head, a whirlwind, a wildfire, laying waste. He ripped locked doors in her mind open, tore thoughts from their chains in echoing caverns, blasted through grains of memory carefully shaped into dunes, heaved islands from the sea, crumbling walls and cliffs and - no, no, not Luke’s island, not that, no - he was screaming through every corner of her mind - not the island, no, she had to resist him - clawing open all of her secrets, all of her hidden thoughts, the endless nights retreating inside her own head, but now there was nowhere to retreat, because he was there, he was _everywhere_ \- _no_ , not there, please, no she had to _resist_ -

She crumpled back into herself, her knees cracking hard against the floor. Her throat was raw from screaming. Her mind felt like it had been reduced to ash, fragile and fluttering on the lightest breeze. Her face was wet. She was empty - nothing.

Snoke was laughing. 

 

* * *

 

The trees were shivering as Luke made his way along the valley, the light of his torch scattering shadows among their leaves. The Tree itself was dark, and silent, as if it had somehow sensed why he had come.

He stared at it for a long time. 

“Forgotten my lessons, you have.”

Luke spun around, the torch spluttering. Yoda was lit by a faint blue glow, hunched on a rock, his eyes crinkled with amusement. 

“Do or do not,” he said. 

“There is no try,” Luke answered, half-exasperated, half-amused. “It’s been a long time.”

“Changed much, you have.”

“You haven’t.”

Yoda gurgled with laughter. “Changed not at all, have I!”

“Yes,” said Luke. “I can tell.”

“Burn the Tree, you were going to?” 

“Yes,” he said, defiantly. “It’s time. It’s time for the Jedi to end.”

“Mmm.” Yoda got to his feet slowly, using his stick to help. “Pleased, Rey would not be.”

“I won’t train her. She has too much of the dark side in her. I can sense it. Too much focus on her past. As strong as she is-”

“Huh! Always looking to the horizon, you were,” said Yoda. “Trained you, I still did.”

“It’s not the same.”

“Mmmph. Perhaps it does not matter,” said Yoda. “Much knowledge of the Force, she has. More than she knows.” He cackled. “More than you know she knows!”

“The Jedi are going to end, Master Yoda. I will be the last.”

“Then burn the Tree, you should, hm?”

Luke looked back at the Tree, its stubby branches stretching above him, towards the stars.He looked at the torch in his hand. 

“You hesitate,” said Yoda, scolding. He lifted his hand.

A bolt of white-hot lightning struck the centre of the tree, exploding shards of wood into the silence of the night. Luke stumbled back as the entire tree went up in flames. Yoda was giggling like a delighted child.

Luke stared at him. “But the Tree - the books - ancient Jedi knowledge, preserved for millennia-!“

“Mmm. Read them, you have?”

“Well, I - I’ve _looked_ at them. Briefly.”

Yoda huffed with laughter. “Like water, you are. Always running, never still. Always so sure of where you are going.” He tilted his head. “Page-turners, they were not. Old books, old words. For an old universe.”

“Master Yoda, you agree with me then? That the Jedi must end?”

“Hmph!” Yoda tapped the ground. “You think this, why?”

“The Force must have balance. By existing the Jedi disrupt that, and the outcome is the Sith. The Empire. The First Order. Darkness.”

Yoda frowned, his ears turning down. “Foolish, you are! Balance, balance, all about balance, you say. Think you that the Jedi are not also a part of this? Think you that they are not also a product of the Force? Foolish!” Yoda aimed a jab at him with his stick. “Ah, Skywalker. Always headstrong, always stubborn. Changed you have, mmph. But not that much.” He settled on the ground more comfortably as the tree continued to burn. “Missed you, I have.”

Luke sat down beside him, heavily, feeling the old weariness in his bones. A shower of sparks whooshed up from the Tree as half of it fell in on itself.

“Wrong you are about the Jedi,” said Yoda. “Wrong you are about the girl. Strong Force-users, there will always be. Without guidance, without the Jedi… Fear. Anger. Hate.”

“But-“

“Oh yes, balance there would be. Eventually. Replaced, the Jedi Order would be. But until then…” Yoda rapped him on the knees with the stick. “Chaos. Stronger, the Dark Side would become. Much pain. Much suffering.”

“Master Yoda, I tried. I tried to train more Younglings. But I failed. Worse than failed. I created the thing I was trying to prevent.”

“Mmmm. Blame yourself, you do.”

“Of course I do! I sensed the darkness in him. I tried to stop it. Contain it. Train him to reject it. But nothing I did worked.”

“Destroyed it, you could have.”

Luke gave him a sharp look. 

“Destroyed it, you did not.” Yoda’s voice softened. “Not all of my lessons, forgotten you have. Hmmmm.” His wrinkled brow furrowed in thought, ears waggling. “Hope, there still is, if you will still look for it.” 

 

* * *

 

“Good,” Snoke’s fingers tightened around the arms of his throne as he leaned forwards. “Good. I had no idea Luke Skywalker was so _sensible_. I will teach him a final lesson on how to bring about the end of the Jedi Order. _Good_.”

Rey struggled to get up. The cuffs were smoking on the floor beside her, wrenched open by the sheer force of her struggle to throw Snoke from her mind. The Supreme Leader curved his neck to look at her. 

“See this, Kylo Ren? See the anger, see the strength? Still she fights. Still she believes that she can win.” He curled a finger around and she went rigid, her eyes wide and terrified. “She knows in her heart that she cannot, and yet still she struggles. Still she believes that you will come around to the light.” He let out a breathy chuckle. “Your weakness gives her hope.”

Ren clenched his jaw. “Master-“

“I see it within her. She pities you. You, Master of the Knights of Ren, who killed your own father before her eyes, whose might and power she has seen across the galaxy - and still she pities you. You see now where your weakness leads? She _pities_ you.” 

He felt the anger burning, smouldering inside him, helpless. His fists clenched. 

Snoke pushed himself off his throne and advanced towards them, slowly, moving stiffly. He circled Rey, while she tried desperately to follow him with her eyes, and then smiled. 

“I see your mind, Kylo Ren. I see the murder in your heart. I see it burning strongly now. _Good_.”

Luke Skywalker’s lightsaber flew into Snoke’s withered hand. He examined it, carefully. “This lightsaber will bring about the end of the Jedi Order,” he said. “We have no further use for the girl. Do you see her? Do you see the pity in her eyes? Even now, she sees your weakness. Even now she seeks to exploit it.” He held out the saber. “Destroy her.”

He took the saber, activated it. He saw Rey sob, violently, still struggling against Snoke’s Force hold on her. The tear tracks on her face shone blue in the saber’s light.

“Good,” Snoke encouraged, the skin of his throat twitching. “I sense the darkness rising in you, feeding your strength. Destroy your weakness.”

He hesitated, the saber blade trembling beside her neck. 

“Destroy it,” Snoke growled. “Fulfil your destiny.”

He swung.

Rey screamed. Snoke didn’t make a sound. 

The top half of his body slid slowly to the floor, dark robes fluttering, as the bottom half collapsed. His mouth worked briefly and then was still.

Kylo Ren sheathed the lightsaber.

“You killed him,” said Rey, gasping. 

“Yes,” he said. “I did.”

Around the room, the guards activated their weapons. 

He tossed the saber hilt to Rey and drew his own, activating it while launching himself at the nearest one, driving it straight through the guard’s chest. 

Ren yanked it out and ducked under the next one’s vibroblade, searching for the Force to steady him. He grasped onto it and whirled, catching another guard in the side. Another came at him and he blocked, the sparks showering down around him, mingling red and blue. He was aware of Rey, on the other side of the room, her lightsaber flashing as she dodged and blocked and parried. 

He moved towards her, closer to the centre of the room, still working furiously to ward off the attacks of three - no four - guards at once. He caught three blades on his crossguard and used his spare hand to pull a fallen blade across the room to plunge into the back of the fourth. 

Rey was moving towards him, as well, fighting like a demon, her teeth bared. She was holding the hilt of the sabre with both hands, as if it were a staff, whirling it around with such speed that it was a blur. 

He ducked under another slice, shoving it hard with the Force into the chest of the guard on his other side, and then slashed downwards with his lightsaber, almost cleaving the first guard in two. The anger was roaring within him now, savage and wild. He beat the next guard back with sheer strength, striking again and again, smashing his saber against the vibroblade furiously. The guard stumbled on the body of a fallen comrade and he swung a final time, sending its head spinning from its shoulders. 

There were more of them. It was taking all of his concentration to keep hold of the Force, twisting and thrashing within him, keeping his reflexes sharp, allowing him to dominate the fight. He snarled as it slipped for a moment, and one of the guards seized him around the neck. Ren struggled against it, but the lobstered amour plates tightened, choking him. 

“Ben!” Rey was running across the room, stooping to pick up a fallen vibrostaff as she tossed her lightsaber hilt at him.

He stretched out and pulled it into his hand, then flicked the button on. The pressure on his throat vanished. Kylo Ren ducked under another guard’s attack, threw his old mentor’s lightsaber aside, and returned to the fight.

 

* * *

 

“Ready for the hyperspace jump in thirty minutes, Vice-Admiral,” said Rose. 

Vice-Admiral Holdo was staring out of the window in their temporary command centre, her purple hair lit by the blaster fire and explosions of the battle raging outside, the occasional flashes as the _Raddus’_ deflector shields were activated. Her knuckles were white as she clenched the edge of the console in front of her.

“It won’t be enough,” she muttered. “They won’t hold that long.”

Beside her, another fighter outline flicked to red. She seemed to be staring at it without seeing. 

“Too much loss,” she said, softly. “You taught me how to bear it, Leia, but how much before it’s too much to bear?”

She turned back from the window. “Any word from our allies? The other squadrons? Captain Dameron? Is anyone coming?”

“Nothing so far,” said Rose. Her fingers were shaking on the console. She wondered if this was how Paige felt, in the minutes before her death. No, it couldn’t be. Because Paige had died a hero, knowing that she had brought down a dreadnought. And Rose was going to die knowing that they had been so close… and failed.

Vice-Admiral Holdo nodded, almost to herself, and then seemed to come to a decision. She walked to the door, pausing to look back. 

“I’m promoting you to Captain, Lieutenant Tico. If Dameron comes back, tell him that I’ve reinstated his command. The Force knows we’ll need him,” she said. “If any of our allies come, tell them the last words of General Organa.”

She raised her eyes to the stars outside the window.

“‘May the Force be with you. Always.’”

She left.

 

* * *

 

The room was suddenly, violently silent. 

They stood together, breathing hard, back-to-back amongst the wreckage.

Ben Solo sheathed his lightsaber. 

Rey touched the wound on her arm, gently, feeling the wetness of blood on her fingers. It was the only thing that felt real. 

“I destroyed him,” said Ben, almost to himself, almost as if he were trying to convince himself he’d done it. “You said I could be free of him. And I am. He said that I wasn’t powerful enough, but he was wrong.”

“Ben-“

“He was wrong about me,” he said, his fists clenching. “He said he saw weakness. He was wrong.” He looked at her. “He was wrong about you, too.”

“Ben, listen-“

“I’m not Ben any more! Don’t you understand? We’re free now. Free of the past. We cut ourselves free. It doesn’t matter any more. We can move beyond it - leave it behind. It’s dead.”

“Then come with me. Come away from the dark side. It doesn’t have to control you any more,” she said, because she could feel the darkness within him, the patterns, the grains swirling within him, shifting, fighting with the sparks of light. “I’ll help you.”

He looked at her in surprise. “It doesn’t control me. I told you. It gives me strength.”

She stared up at him. “But - I saw your future, Ben! I know - I _saw_ you. I saw you turn.”

“Then I’m glad I saw the past. The Force granted us both visions, but only I saw truth,” he said. “You saw nothing more than a possibility. A false hope. A lie.” He fixed dark eyes onto hers. “You know, don’t you? I saw it in your face. You know who your parents were. All those years, you kept that false hope, but you were only lying to yourself.”

She _did_ know. It had been hidden, deep within her mind, but Snoke had torn all those carefully-constructed defences down and left the wound within her raw. And now she couldn’t ignore it any longer, couldn’t hide from her own truth.

“Who were they? Say it, Rey. All that pain, all that loneliness, and for what?”

“Nobody,” she whispered. “They were nobody. Nothing.”

“They were junkers. Low-lifes. They sold you for the chance to drink themselves into oblivion again. They could have come back for you, but they never thought you were worth it.” Ben twisted his face in disgust. “You were lucky not to know them. They’re dead, you know that? Buried in some forgotten grave on some forgotten planet. No-one who knew them mourns.”

The tears were running down her face again, blurring her vision and making her lips taste of salt. _You’re lying_ , she wanted to say. But she couldn’t. Couldn’t go back to before, when she had managed to bury her memories and forget. 

“You sense it, just as I do,” said Ben, suddenly. “Both strong with the Force, both betrayed by the people we trusted. We could do great things, you and I. We could right all those wrongs.” He held out a hand to her.

“Don’t - don’t do this, Ben. Please.” She felt the hope trickling away like sand, shifting under her feet. This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. 

“The Jedi, the Sith - they’re finished. History. We have to forget the past. We can forge something new. Something stronger.” He sounded like a frightened child, somehow, trying to shout out his bravery in the dark. She shook her head.

“No, Ben. You know it can’t be like that. Come with me. Come and heal.”

“I can’t let you stand against me,” he said, wide-eyed, trembling. “We’ll destroy each other.”

They stood for a moment, staring at each other, each silently begging the other to listen, to understand.

Luke’s lightsaber jumped towards Rey’s hand, at the same moment as Ben stretched out his own. It jerked in midair between them, trembling. The world closed in around it, twitching and jerking, first towards her, then him. He was closer; the fingers of his left hand were almost touching it. Rey felt the pressure building up between them, enormous, crushing. The air between them was humming with it. It was far too big now for her to control or direct, far beyond breaking point-

It broke.

 

* * *

 

They burst out of hyperspace almost on top of the _Raddus_ , which was surrounded by a swarm of smaller fighters, its shields occasionally flaring as blaster shots hit. X-wings and TIE fighters were flashing and glittering like a shoal of fish behind it as they flipped and swerved and twisted around each other. Behind the battle, the First Order ships loomed ever closer, their ion cannons glowing threateningly. From their position, they could see the entire battle clearly - and there were far more First Order fighters than Resistance.

“Good work, buddy, I knew I could count on you,” called Poe. “Exactly where you calculated they’d be.”

BB-8 burbled woozily, its head rocking back and forth slightly as it tried to rotate it. 

“Don’t worry about it, BB, I’ve got this. Happy beeps. Me and Finn have got this,” said Poe. “You just keep up that jamming signal, alright? We’ll take care of everything else.”

Finn felt his head jerked back into the seat as they accelerated towards the ships, Poe curving the A-wing around to keep the _Raddus_ in view as they approached. All three ships had taken heavy damage, Finn saw, but their hyperdrives were glowing steadily brighter as he watched. 

“All wings, this is Black Leader, is anyone receiving?”

“Poe! Is that you?” came a voice over the comms. 

“Lintra? What’s going on? Who’s in command here?”

“The ships are out of fuel, we can’t keep accelerating. We’re nearly ready to jump but we need more time.” There was a pause. “General Organa… General Organa is dead. Admiral Ackbar is dead. They’re all gone.”

Finn felt the heavy weight of horror settle in his stomach. In front of him, Poe was silent. 

“They hit the _Raddus_ ’ command centre. Vice-Admiral Holdo was the only one who survived, but she’s gone… we don’t know where she’s gone. Rose says she took a ship and left. We need you, Poe, we’re getting hammered out here.”

Poe was silent for another few seconds. Then he pressed the open-channel button.

“All wings, this is Black Leader. Leaders report in.”

“Blue Leader, standing by,” said Lintra, sounding relieved.

“Dagger Three, standing by. We’ve taken heavy losses. Arana’s down.”

“Stiletto standing by,” came Kun’s voice. “Good to have you back, Poe.”

“Black Squadron, waiting for your command,” said Jessika.

“Alright, we’ve gotta protect our ships.” Poe banked, sweeping around the edge of the battlefield. It looked like complete chaos to Finn’s eyes for the first few moments, until he remembered his training and began to see the patterns. “Dagger Squadron, I want you to pull back to the _Raddus_. Make it look like you’re panicking. Stiletto, cover them - pick off as many of their tails as you can get.” Poe grunted as a TIE fighter swept past and he threw the A-wing into a tight spin to avoid the blaster fire.

“This is Dagger Three. Heard and understood.”

“Black Leader, this is Stiletto. You can count on us.”

“Blue Squadron, drop under the fighting and throw in some feints towards their Destroyers. Don’t get within range, you’re just trying to draw some of their fighters off. Black Squadron, divide and conquer. Keep ‘em busy.”

“Blue Squadron, on me,” came Lintra’s voice. “Let’s give them a scare.”

“Understood, Black Leader,” said Jessika. 

Poe flipped his A-wing into another tight spin and took out another TIE fighter. “They may have better ships but we sure as hell have better pilots. Let’s show ‘em what Rebel scum can really do.”

He took his finger off the comms button and slumped back against his seat. Finn reached forwards to grip his shoulder. “Poe, you alright? Is your leg…?”

“Yeah… Yeah. Yeah, I’m good. How’s BB-8 doin’?”

“Still hanging in there,” said Finn. The little droid was plugged into the auxiliary powerline, the light on its scope dim but steady now. 

“Listen, Finn, I need you to keep an eye on the battle. Without BB I can’t fly this thing and-“ He grunted again as they jerked sideways- “Can’t fly and look at the same time. I need you to tell me what’s going on.”

“Yeah, I got this,” said Finn, trying to sound more confident than he felt. Stormtrooper infantry training covered battle tactics, obviously - but _ground_ battle tactics. He didn’t think many of them would apply here. And it didn’t help that they kept turning upside down. Or the battle kept turning upside down. Or maybe both. Space was confusing. 

“Okay, I think that’s Dagger heading back to our ships,” he said. There’s a lot of bad guys out there, Poe, I can’t really see- No, wait, yeah. They’re sending a division after them. And there’s a division coming for us! Behind us, coming in fast.” 

“That’s flattering,” said Poe, throttling back and neatly flipping the fighter upside down to face them head-on. “Buckle up, buddy, looks like this is going to be a fun ride.”

“I do not like your idea of fun,” muttered Finn.

 

* * *

 

“Ben Solo.”

Rey opened her eyes. There was a dark shape above her, and red- red everywhere. She remembered what had happened. She struggled up onto her hands.

Kylo Ren was on the other side of the room, on his feet, staggering, his lightsaber dragging sparks along the floor. His left arm was cradled against his chest, the sleeve tattered, the fabric’s charred edges glowing red. Luke’s lightsaber was in the centre of the room, in two pieces, broken neatly in half. 

And beside her, Luke Skywalker shrugged off his cloak. 

“You,” said Kylo Ren, thickly. “I’d hoped you were dead.”

“I’m full of surprises,” said Luke. He looked down at Rey. “This is my fight. You should leave. Take the saber with you.”

“But… it’s broken.” She got up, shakily. Every muscle ached. Every nerve was screaming at her. She glanced at Kylo Ren, who was still struggling to stay on his feet, his eyes dazed - and back to Luke, standing calm and serene among the wreckage of bodies. Between them, Supreme Leader Snoke’s wrinkled face stared up at the ceiling in surprise.

“Broken? I’m sure you won’t let that stop you,” he said. “Go now. Back to the Resistance. They need you.” The weariness that had been on him since she’d met him had lifted a little, somehow. The crushing weight had lessened. His eyes were clear.

“I’ll see you again, padawan.”

 

* * *

 

The A-wing was shuddering under his hands as he forced it into another series of tight loops and manoeuvres, picking off the TIE fighters one by one, dodging blaster fire while the ships spun dizzyingly outside the cockpit. Poe gritted his teeth and held it steady. His leg was agony, but at least the pain was keeping him alert. 

“Stiletto are incoming,” reported Finn. “They’re going for the TIE fighters around Dagger. Yeah!” he whooped suddenly. “They’re gettin ‘em.”

“Good work, Stiletto,” called Poe, on the comms. “Keep it up.”

“Copy that, Black Leader.”

“The TIE fighters have taken the bait; we’ve got a clear shot on _Supremacy_ ,” reported Lintra, excitedly. “It’ll be hot but I think we can do some damage.”

He swung the A-wing around to get a clearer look at the battlefield. “Negative, Blue Leader. Pull back. We need you defending the ships. It’s not worth the risk.”

“Copy that,” she said, sounding disappointed. “Blue Squadron, on me.”

“The Falcon’s got a lot of company,” said Finn. “They’re not firing back. Why aren’t they firing back? There are loads of TIE fighters following them, why aren’t they firing back?”

“Black Squadron, I want someone on the Millennium Falcon. Looks like they’re trying to pick up tails. Don’t waste their good work.”

“On it, Poe,” said Threnalli.

He picked off another TIE fighter, hissing the pain out through his teeth. 

“Poe! Poe, there’s a ship coming from _Supremacy_. It’s not a TIE fighter,” said Finn, excitedly. “It looks like an officer’s ship. But bigger.”

“Kylo Ren?”  
“I think it might be _Snoke_ ,” said Finn, leaning forwards to peer out of the window. 

“I’m on it.” Poe throttled forwards, hearing the engines roar as they accelerated. If Snoke was entering the battle, who knew what kind of carnage he could wreak? And if they could take him out now, what could that mean for the Resistance? He narrowed his eyes, focusing on the ship as it swooped out from _Supremacy_ \- and then looped back around, heading for the flagship’s rear engines. 

“…The hell is he doing?” he said, and then had to swerve as he came within range of the Star Destroyer’s turbocannons. 

Bursts of light shot from Snoke’s ship - towards the _Supremacy_. An explosion bloomed out from the deck. One of the massive engines flickered and died.

The turbocannons had stopped firing at them - now they were directing a barrage of laser fire at the little ship, which began racing back towards the battle, dodging and weaving as it streaked towards their A-wing.

“Did you see that?” gaped Finn. “He just took out his own engines! Did you _see_ that?”

“I saw it. That can’t be Snoke,” said Poe. “Reckon Hux has finally cracked?”

“No - no!” Finn cried, suddenly. “I know who it is! It’s Rey! It’s gotta be Rey! And Luke Skywalker! _That’s_ why the Falcon isn’t firing back, it doesn’t have a copilot. That’s Rey!”

Snoke’s ship hurtled past, without even dipping from its course. Poe stared at it.

“I think you’re right,” he said, wonderingly. “All wings, hold your fire on Snoke’s ship. I think it’s one of ours.”

 

* * *

 

“I owe you an apology, Ben,” Luke said. “I failed you. I’m sorry.”

“I bet you are,” snarled Ben. “Now that you have seen how powerful I have become.” He was shaking his head, still dazed from the blast that had knocked both him and Rey out. Luke watched him, calmly.

“You were always powerful,” he said. “You’re a Skywalker.”

Ben hissed. “You have no idea how powerful. Snoke didn’t either.”

“He underestimated the pull of the dark side on you. And I overestimated the pull of the light. I thought you had more of your mother in you.”

“Don’t speak of her,” Ben shouted, the lightsaber in his hand shaking, still dragging sparks on the floor, the crossguards flaring. “Your precious Resistance is over. You’re too late.”

“Perhaps,” Luke acknowledged. He took a breath. His lungs were burning. “For many things. But not for everything.”

“You will be the last Jedi!” shouted Ren. “The Resistance is _finished_. I will rule the galaxy as my grandfather did before me!”

“Astonishing.” Luke raised his head. “Every word of that sentence was wrong.”

Ren stepped forwards, his lightsaber crackling. Luke unsheathed his own. The green light flared. 

“You will never be Darth Vader,” he said. He took a step forwards. “The Resistance will be stronger after today.” Another step. “And I will not be the last Jedi.”

Ren let out a wordless roar of rage and launched himself at him. Luke sidestepped and whirled to face him as he skidded around, teeth bared in a snarl. 

“Are you going to kill me, Ben?” he asked. “Do you think it will bring you peace? If you strike me down in anger, do you think you will ever be rid of me?”

He roared again, lunged again. Luke ducked and whirled his lightsaber past Ren’s face, forcing him to step backwards, then followed it up with another lightning slash, inches from his former apprentice’s chest. Ren responded with a series of wild swings and blows, while Luke dodged and weaved and spun to avoid them. 

He couldn’t keep this up much longer, he knew, but Rey and the Resistance needed time. And he could give them that. 

He went on the attack again, and Ren was pushed onto the defensive, struggling to bring his saber up in time to avoid the blows. Every time he tried to block, Luke switched his stroke, falling effortlessly into another position. It had been a long time since he had fought with a saber, but he felt himself settling back into the rhythm of the fight easily. He could see the struggle on Ren’s face, the frustration of none of his blows even coming close to hitting home. 

His swings were becoming wilder, more savage, more desperate. Luke was struggling, too, although he knew that Ren wouldn’t see it. He renewed his focus, screwed his mind to the utmost, stretching out with the Force. Every movement flowing into the next, every stroke deliberate, every position calculated. Their sabers were whirling around each other faster and faster, red and green blurring together. 

He couldn’t go on any more. It was time.

They broke apart for a second: Luke tranquil, still, his lightsaber held lightly at his side; Ren panting, anger burning in his eyes. His left hand was missing, Luke noticed - the sleeve ended in nothing.

Luke sheathed his saber.

Ren screamed as he launched himself forwards, putting all of his strength into the blow, a savage cut right towards Luke’s chest, aimed to slice right through him.

It sliced right through him.

Luke turned.

His body was trembling with exhaustion, his breaths coming short and his lungs burning with the effort of it. He knew Ren wouldn’t see that. All Ren would see was his old mentor, calm and serene and whole, staring him down with steady blue eyes. In his mind’s eye, Luke saw double suns setting, fringing the clouds around them with gold. He smiled.

“Don’t get cocky. I’ll see you around, kid.”

He let go.

 

* * *

 

On Ahch-To, the twin shadows from the Meditation Rock almost stretched back to the pool. The water over the stone patterns trembled, briefly, as a gust of wind took the robe away towards the ocean. On the rock, the light glinted orange and gold off blaster-marked metal fingers, already cooling.

The double suns sank below the horizon. 

 

* * *

 

From the cockpit of their A-wing, it just felt like an endless whirl of lights and explosions and spinning. Finn didn’t understand how anyone could fly one of these things: by the time he’d spotted a TIE-fighter, Poe had already gunned it down; by the time he’d realised one was on their tail, they had already banked into a spin and it had shot past. 

He focused on the other fighters instead. Blue Squadron was struggling, its fighters weaving and looping around each other as they tried to shake off each others’ tails. There were only a few of Dagger Squadron left, now flying with Stiletto, which were desperately trying to harry the clouds of TIE fighters swarming around the _Raddus_ , lighting up its shields with their blaster bolts. 

“Finn, what’s… what’s going on out there?” panted Poe, throwing the fighter into yet another spin as they looped around to drop onto a TIE fighter’s tail. 

“Blue Squadron’s splintering,” he said. “I think the First Order are trying to split them up.”

“Yeah, okay.” Poe pressed the comms button. “Black Squadron, go… go help Blue. Blue Squadron, don’t- don’t let ‘em… don’t split up, Lintra.”

“Copy that, Black Leader,” she said. “There are too many of them out here.”

“Just hold on,” said Poe, and then grunted in pain as he wrenched the fighter sideways, a TIE fighter flashing past silently. 

“Poe?” 

“Finn, buddy, I… I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t trust you. I…” Poe shook his head. “I can’t think straight anymore. I can’t lead like this. You’ve gotta tell ‘em what…”

The ship lurched into a spin, almost too slow to avoid another salvo of blaster fire. 

“Poe, you can’t fly like this! You’ve got to head back to the ship-“

“ _No._ ” Poe sounded determined. “I can fly. But we need… we need a leader, Finn, you… you can do it.”

“What? No, Poe, I can’t- Listen, I don’t know _anything_ about starfighting, I’m _infantry-“_

“The squadron leaders… they know what they’re doing,” said Poe. “They just… need someone to follow. Need to know they’re part of a plan. Not out there on their own. I trust you. You got this.” 

He pressed his lips together. They already had a strategy. They just needed to believe that someone was in control. He could do that. He _could_. “Okay. Yeah. I got this. I got this!” 

“All wings, this is Black Leader,” said Poe. He sounded exhausted. “I’m handing over command to Finn. Keep makin’ the Resistance proud today.”

“Poe, what’s wrong? Are you hit?” Stiletto Leader’s voice crackled. “We need you, Black Leader, we can’t keep this up much longer.”

“All wings, this is Finn. Uh- Black Leader. Finn.” He grimaced. “Listen. I know you’re tired. I know it seems hopeless. There are too many of them and there’s not enough of us. We’re not gonna win. But it’s not about destroying the First Order today. It’s about protecting what matters. It’s about protecting our friends. Our families. It’s about protecting the hope that one day it’s gonna be better. That’s how we’ll win. Not by destroying what we hate. By defending what matters.”

“Yeah!” called one of the other pilots, over the comm.

“We’re with you, Black Leader,” said Lintra. 

“Copy that,” said one of the others.

“Where,” said Poe, his voice strained, “did _that_ come from?”

Finn shrugged, his heart still hammering. “Sometimes I listen when you talk.”

The Resistance fighters struggled on, the battle blurring into an endless whirl of light and explosions and spinning. Finn tried as best he could to work out what was going on, to call back fighters who were going too far astray or direct the others to where there were gaps in the defences. Poe was beginning to struggle, he could tell. His manoeuvres were getting sluggish, his reflexes dulling. He had started missing shots. Finn wondered how much longer he could keep going. How much longer they could all keep going.

“All ships.” A woman’s calm voice suddenly filled the cockpit. “This is Vice-Admiral Amilyn Holdo, on the bridge of the _Ninka_. The ship is damaged; I can’t receive incoming communications. All wings, prepare to return to the ships. All ships, prepare to jump to hyperspeed. That is an order. It’s been an honour to serve with you all.”

“What the hell…?” muttered Poe. 

“That’s suicide. The Fleet’ll be unprotected - there’s no way we’ll make it back and make the jump in time,” said Finn. “The First Order’ll pick us off like it’s target practice. We’ll be annihilated.”

Poe didn’t answer. He had tipped his helmet back against the headrest.

“Poe,” said Finn. “ _Poe_.”

“Yeah.” He sounded rough. “Yeah, still here.”

“Poe, do we head back to the fleet? Holdo said she doesn’t get our communications, she doesn’t know what’s going on. Do we-“

“Black Leader! Poe! Poe Dameron!” Rose’s voice came through on the comms system. “Are you there? Can you hear me?”

“I hear you, Rose, what’s… what’s going on down there? What’s Holdo doing?”

“We’re nearly ready for the jump now - she gave me a message - she didn’t know you’d make it back, she told me to tell you, she made you Commander again, she said we’d need you, she wanted me to say… she said General Organa would’ve wanted to’ve said…”

“Said what?”

“‘May the Force be with you always,’” said Rose.

There was a moment of silence. 

Poe turned his head. “Do it. Back to the ship.”

“All wings, this is Black Leader. Get in position to head back to the ships,” called Finn. “Prepare for a jump.” He took his finger off the button. “She’d better know what she’s doing,” he muttered.

 

* * *

 

Kylo Ren stood by the window, staring out at the carnage of the battle outside, still breathing hard. His left wrist ached. The throne room behind him was still dripping with streaks of molten metal; the lightsaber hilt in his hand was still shaking. He ignored the showers of sparks bursting from whatever control panels he had cut through, which were spluttering over the bodies of the Elite Guards lying scattered around the floor. 

The Rebels were fighting hard. Somewhere out there, Rey was flying a stolen First Order ship back to her pathetic friends. He hoped that they shot her down. He hoped that the TIE fighters shot them all down. The Rebel ships were out of fuel, and they hadn’t managed to jump to hyperspeed; it was only a matter of time before the First Order obliterated them. He could almost taste the sharp tang of their fear and exhaustion. Today was the start of the new history. _His_ history.

He stared at the fighters, criss-crossed with flashes of green and red as they ducked and wove around each other. The Rebels seemed to be falling back, huddling around their main ship like frightened children seeking reassurance from their mother. The larger ships were clustering together, still desperately trying to escape. It was hopeless. Luke Skywalker couldn’t save them. His eyes narrowed in satisfaction. Perhaps he should take his fighter and-

Not all of the ships. One was turning. _Had_ turned. Was facing directly towards the _Supremacy_. With the faint blue glow of its engines visible-

“ _No_!”

He stumbled away from the window, sparks showering over him as every piece of exposed metal in the room twisted and clenched in towards him in horror. 

The world flared into light.

 

* * *

 

There was a streak of brilliant white. 

It scored a line almost straight through the looming mass of Snoke’s flagship, momentarily illuminating a burst of shrapnel against the stars. A swirl of fire blossomed out from where it had buried itself deep within the hulk of the Star Destroyer. Twisted fragments of metal along the slash glowed briefly white before fading through blue to yellow-orange and then red. 

Finn blinked.

“She rammed them,” he said, wonderingly, as Poe threw the ship forwards with a jerk, gritting his teeth. “Did you see that? She rammed _Snoke!_ ”

Poe was breathing hard as he banked around; he didn’t answer. The other fighters were swarming, queuing up to slip back through the port doors and into the hangar, many of them marked by plasma scorches or with blaster holes gaping. The comms systems were chattering as they all tried to process what had happened. The TIE fighters were streaming back towards _Supremacy_ , which hung in clouds of its own debris, the scar gaping along its quarterdeck still glowing cherry-red. 

“All wings - we’ve only got a few minutes, we’re ready to make the jump, you need to get back to the ship _now_ ,” came Rose’s voice over the comms, and Poe joined the last few stragglers darting towards the open bay doors.

Finn whooped, punching the air, as the fighter’s legs touched down and the last of the other pilots flew in. The ground crews were cheering, hugging each other and the pilots as they stumbled down from their ships looking more shocked than joyful.

“Yeah! We made it! We did it. We made it, Poe!” he shouted, grinning. 

“Yeah,” said Poe. “We did.”

Then he blacked out.

 

* * *

 

Hux stumbled through the smoke and sparks to reach the throne room, ducking under the twisted wreckage of the door. He didn’t understand what had happened - how it had all gone so wrong. One moment they had been closing the net - the Rebels out of fuel, unable to jump to hyperspeed, dangling neatly on a string. The next… Half of the flagship had been ripped apart, the fighters had panicked, and the Rebels had disappeared - with the tracking beacon on that stormtrooper nowhere to be seen and Supreme Leader Snoke’s private ship missing.

He hoped that Snoke had somehow seen the impending destruction of his ship and left. That meant that he wouldn’t be in his throne room.

Unfortunately, he saw, Snoke _was_ still in his throne room. Both halves of him.

It was utter carnage. Elite Guards lying like droplets of blood spattered across the floor, many of them with neat lightsaber wounds scorched through their armour. Snoke slumped in the centre of the floor, severed through the middle. Every piece of metal in the place twisted, melted, or warped beyond recognition. 

And Kylo Ren lying motionless beside the window, his eyes closed.

Hux’s hand strayed to the blaster pistol at his hip, almost without thinking about it.

It would just be so _easy_. With Snoke dead, the First Order would need a new leader. And Hux had seen enough of Kylo Ren’s sulks and violent moodswings to know that he would be a dangerous one at best. This could finally be the chance to have unfettered control - without Snoke undermining him at every turn or Kylo Ren’s prickly interference…

Ren stirred and the moment passed. Even half-conscious, he could stop a blaster bolt with nothing more than a thought, and Hux didn’t want to consider what would happen _after_ that.

“What happened?” he demanded, as soon as Ren blinked open his eyes and struggled upright.

“Snoke’s dead. They _rammed_ us,” Ren said, his voice thick with rage.

“Obviously.” Hux pressed his lips together. “The girl?”

“Gone.”

“You let her escape?”

Ren snarled. “You let her get away? You let those filthy Rebels _ram my ship_?”

“ _Your_ ship?” Hux narrowed his eyes. “I think you’ll find that _I_ am the senior commander here. You-“

His voice spluttered and died in his throat.

“You-“

Ren’s fist tightened. 

“The Supreme Leader is dead,” he hissed. “Think wisely about your next words, General.”

The pressure loosened, just slightly - but the pure, burning hatred bubbling in his chest kept his voice constricted anyway, so much so that he could barely spit the words out. Damn Kylo Ren. Damn him, and damn Supreme Leader Snoke, and damn the Jedi and the Sith and the Force and all of it. He sucked in air and looked Kylo Ren in the eyes. 

“Long live the Supreme Leader.”

 

* * *

 

Poe opened his eyes slowly, aware of bright lights above him and voices somewhere nearby. He raised his head and blinked away the fog.

“Hey,” said Finn, from the bed across from his. Rey, sitting perched awkwardly beside him, smiled a little shyly. 

“Hey.” Poe looked down at his leg, which was neatly bandaged, and then at the IV line running into his arm. Everything ached, and his head was oddly fuzzy, but he felt the smile spreading over his face anyway. “What’re you doing in here?”

“They got the tracker out,” said Finn. “I’m all good to go. You are looking at a one-hundred-percent free-range Resistance fighter.”

“You’re not good to go for at least another ten minutes, they said,” Rey reminded him. 

“Yeah, but… okay, fine. In ten minutes I’ll be a one-hundred-percent free-range Resistance fighter.”

“He only just woke up from the anaesthetic. I’m Rey, by the way,” she added.

“Yeah. I know,” he said. “Poe. Poe Dameron.”

She smiled. “Finn said. It’s good to meet you properly.”

“We made it, then.”

“We dropped out of hyperspeed about half an hour ago. So far no sign of the First Order,” she said. 

“I doubt they’ll recover from that in a hurry,” said Poe, and then sat up cautiously. His leg twinged. “Argh. Where’s BB-8?”

“Rose said she’d take a look at him,” said Finn.

Rey hesitated. “They’re… it’s a bit chaotic at the moment. They’ve been waiting for you to wake up.” She glanced at Finn. “We’ve lost most of our leaders. No-one’s really sure what to do now, and Holdo made you a commander, so…”

“But you’re back,” said Poe. “Does that mean you found him? Luke Skywalker, you found him?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I found him.” She twisted her mouth up. “I don’t think he’s coming,” she said, and then raised her chin and added, “But I’m here.”

“He trained you?” said Finn, eagerly. “You’re a Jedi now?”

“I will be,” she said, with determination - and then wavered. “I hope.”

“Do one of those cool Force tricks!” Finn begged. “Make something move. Or shoot lightning out of your hands.”

“The Force,” Rey said, sternly, “is not for cheap tricks.” Poe noticed the tracking bracelet on Finn’s bedside table start to wobble, and the slightly faraway look of concentration on her face. He grinned.

The bracelet lifted up and came to rest gently in Finn’s hand. He gaped, and Rey caught Poe’s raised eyebrows and grinned back.

“That,” Finn managed, “was _so cool_.” He leaned forwards excitedly. “What does it feel like, when you’re-“

He was interrupted by the medical bay door sliding open.

“Little buddy!” cried Poe, tumbling out of his bed and almost tripping over the IV line. BB-8 let out a high-pitched squall, whirring and beeping excitedly and almost crashing into several pieces of medical equipment as it beelined for him. 

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” said Poe, dropping on one knee and practically cuddling the droid. “Yeah, I’m fine, buddy, I’m good. Finn’s fine too. Yeah. And so is Rey.” He ran his hands over BB-8’s main unit. “And look at you, you’re all fixed up! I’m so glad to see you! You did it, little buddy, you did it.”

“He’s good as new,” announced Rose, walking in with Chewbacca behind her. Poe could have sworn that one of the nearby medical officers _winked_ at the wookie. “Lucky for us, stormtroopers aren’t very good shots.”

“Wha-?” protested Finn. “Why does everyone keep saying that? I’m a good shot. You’ve seen me, I’m a good shot!”

“You’re a _terrible_ shot for a stormtrooper,” pointed out Poe, looking up from BB-8 and grinning. “You keep firing at the wrong targets.” He half-shrugged. “Pretty good for a Resistance fighter, though. What do you reckon, buddy?” he added, to his droid, and BB-8 chirped. “Shall we let him stick around?”

“I think we’ll have to,” said Rose. “The Resistance needs everyone we can get right now. I’m Rose Tico,” she added, sticking her hand out to Rey. ”Uh- I guess I should get used to saying _Captain_ Rose Tico.”

“Rey,” said Rey, taking her hand. “Just Rey.”

“Oh! The Jedi! You’re the Jedi, aren’t you?” Rose sounded excited.

Rey looked uncomfortable. “Sort of.”

“Rose, you got promoted!” said Finn. “Congratulations.”

“Yeah, well, there were a lot of shoes that needed filling,” she said. She didn’t sound particularly happy about it. “When Kylo Ren hit the command centre we lost nearly all of our commanders in one. And then Vice-Admiral Holdo…”

“She was a hero,” Finn said, solemnly. 

“She was. They were all heroes,” said Poe.

“They were heroes and we needed them,” said Rose. “No base, no ships, no fuel, no commanders… I don’t know how we’re gonna come back from this.”

BB-8 warbled something. Poe looked down, and then a slow smile spread across his face as he remembered what was on the First Order databanks still sitting in the droid’s memory systems. “I don’t know if we’re gonna be able to,” he said, “but we can sure as hell try.”

 

* * *

 

“They are _finished._ ” He swung around for another circuit of the windows. Hux was standing in the centre of the room, watching him. Ren clenched his fists, the black metal of the left one gleaming. “It’s only a matter of time. They can’t run forever.”

“We need time - to make repairs, to make plans,” Hux said. “Everything that Snoke left unfinished - thousands of projects, the Altterran system, the mining in-“

Ren growled. “No. The Resistance are weak, they are leaderless, they are defenceless, and now is the time to crush them forever.”

“They are no longer a threat to us,” Hux argued. “They will have gone to ground like the rats they are. It will take them months - _years -_ to recover. Our strength grows daily.” His eyes narrowed. “The First Order must have _order_. It must have leadership.”

“It _has_ leadership!” Ren roared. “Do not question me. I see what is in your mind; you think to supplant me.”

“No, Supreme Leader,” Hux said, stiffly. “I only-“

“ _Nothing_ will stand in my way,” swore Ren. He looked out of the window, at the shattered hulk of _Supremacy_ still hanging silently in space while salvage and repair droids buzzed around it.“The Rebels will _burn_.”

 

* * *

 

Rey couldn’t sleep. 

Part of the problem was the bed. She’d never had an actual bed before. A nest of old blankets and scraps of clothes in her AT-AT, yes. The engine cover of her speeder, on frozen nights. Sometimes the floor of a Star Destroyer, if she stayed out too late scavenging and didn’t have time to return home. This one was almost _too_ comfortable.

And she still couldn’t sleep. 

It had been worse than she’d imagined, coming back. Far worse. The Resistance base completely destroyed, most of the Fleet gone, almost all of the senior commanders dead… Even when Luke had told her he’d sensed Leia’s death, she’d been able to convince herself that it might not have been so devastating, that perhaps it had been some accident, or illness… to hope that maybe Luke had even been mistaken.

_There’s no difference between hope and a comforting lie_ , echoed the memory of Kylo Ren in her mind.

Perhaps he was right. She had _hoped_ that Kylo Ren could be turned to the Light. The Resistance had _hoped_ that they could stay hidden from the First Order. They had all _hoped_ that the Jedi would return to bring peace back to the galaxy.

“The difference,” said a voice, “is that lies never make themselves true.”

She sat bolt upright. Leia was sitting on the end of her bed. 

“You’re dead,” she burst out, scrambling out of the covers and staring at her. 

Leia smiled, her eyes kind. “I’m a Skywalker,” she said. “We’re not known for keeping to the rules.”

She was glowing faintly, Rey realised. “You’re… you’re some kind of… ghost?”

“Something like that.”

“Could other people see you?”

“Only if they’re Force-sensitive. I always did wonder about Dameron.”

“We need you,” she blurted out. “Luke’s gone. I… I don’t know how I know, but I do. It’s like… since he came back to the Force, he was in the back of my mind all the time. But now he’s not. And I never - I never even said goodbye.”

“I know.” Leia sighed. “Sometimes you don’t get the chance to.” She sounded infinitely sad. “He let go. As did I.”

“But we need you,” she repeated. “We don’t have any commanders left. You _were_ the Resistance. Now we’re just… just a bunch of fools trying to convince ourselves we can still win.”

“That’s all we ever were,” said Leia. She flared a little brighter for a second. “Eventually we managed to convince the rest of the galaxy too.” She tilted her head. 

“You still have everything you need to do the same.”


End file.
